The editors at Bloomberg have identified the real threat in the controversy over The Interview and North Korea’s hack attack: American overreaction.
Like so many Hollywood movies, North Korea’s offensive against Sony Pictures Entertainment could end badly — which is why U.S. officials have to be careful not to overreact.
. . . Now that unnamed U.S. officials have claimed North Korea is behind the cyberattack that crippled Sony’s computers, some are calling for the government to retaliate. That would be a mistake.
. . . Sony and other corporations can’t expect the U.S. government to respond to every attack on their behalf. However embarrassing and costly to the studio, the hacking represents a cybercrime, not an act of cyberterrorism directed at civilians or vital national infrastructure. (By the same token, threats against theaters showing a Hollywood comedy that mocks Kim Jong Un hardly compare with the vows of annihilation that constantly pour out of North Korean state media.)
What about the consequences of underreaction?
You can literally watch the reaction to a threat from a foreign power in our cities, as Sony quickly removes the billboards . . . how in the world is our reaction the problem here?
Why do we have to be so careful to not provoke them? Why doesn’t anybody ever fear the consequences of angering Americans?