Disney is investigating a breach of its internal Slack channels. The hacker group Nullbulge alleges that it has acquired and leaked over 1 terabyte of data from these channels.
The hacktivist group Nullbulge, which claims to advocate for artists’ rights and fair compensation, has shared screenshots of allegedly downloaded documents. These documents include traffic and revenue data for Disneyland Paris and details of a new streaming feature designed to recommend Disney content based on viewers’ previous watches and was posted to X. The group has promised to release the entire dataset online. In a recent blog post, Nullbulge asserts that the leaked data encompasses information about unreleased projects, raw images, and computer code.
The Wall Street Journal, which initially reported the story, has reviewed several of the files that Nullbulge allegedly obtained and leaked. These files include discussions about maintaining Disney’s corporate website, programs for emerging leaders at ESPN, software development, evaluations of job candidates, and photos of employees’ dogs, with data dating back to at least 2019.
Furthermore, a decade ago, Sony Pictures experienced a catastrophic hack that remains the most significant corporate data breach in U.S. history. Unlike the recent leak involving Disney, the Sony breach exposed much more sensitive information. Years of emails, ranging from trivial to highly unflattering, were made public, causing chaos in Hollywood. The fallout led to the resignation of Amy Pascal, the Academy Award-winning producer and co-CEO of the studio. High-profile names such as Angelina Jolie, Rooney Mara, and President Barack Obama were mentioned in private communications published on Wikileaks. The breach also crippled the studio’s operations, forcing manual processing of payroll and leaving the company unable to use any technology for days.