In the future we’ll say this was a template for future attacks.

The emails also reveal myriad surprises and previously unreported anecdotes, including one episode in which Sony spied on its own employees’ emails. Paradoxically, the hacked emails and documents provide a telling window into how and why such a disastrous hack succeeded and what companies need to do to protect themselves—which is precisely why Fortune has chosen to use this material. (For more on our thinking, see Editor’s Desk here.)

Source: Sony Pictures: Inside the Hack of the Century, Part 1 – Fortune

How can you protect an attack that comes from the place where you make a living? The consequences for these things range from unauthorized purchases to emptied bank accounts to complete identity theft.

The scary part is it will only get worse.