Sony Pictures is now streaming “The Interview”, a movie that outraged North Korea by poking fun at dictator Kim Jong-Un and the isolated nation.
The film is now available for rent in the United States through Google Play, YouTube and Microsoft’s Xbox platform for $5.99. A dedicated website www.seetheinterview.com also is streaming the video.
Netflix is also rumored to be in talks with Sony to stream the film, according to Variety.
“Last Wednesday Sony began contacting a number of companies, including Google, to ask if we’d be able to make their movie, ‘The Interview,’ available online,” Google’s Chief Legal Officer David Drummond wrote in a blog post.
The Google-distributed film stream, expected on Wednesday afternoon, will come almost a full day ahead of the theater release.
A devastating cyberattack against Sony in November, followed by threatening attacks on cinemas screening the film, prompted the entertainment giant to cancel the Christmas Day release of the movie.
While the online release will certainly spark more outrage from North Korea and the threat actors allegedly behind the attacks against Sony, it will be very challenging for the attackers to successfully disrupt the streaming services.
Google and Netflix’s massive and robust infrastructure will be virtually impossible to disrupt via a DDoS or other attack.
President Obama has warned North Korea that it would face retaliation for the attack, but has not said what that may entail.
Addressing reporters after the FBI said Pyongyang was to blame, Obama said Washington would never bow to “some dictator.”
“We will respond. We will respond proportionately and we’ll respond in a place and time and manner that we choose,” Obama said.
North Korea’s Internet was disrupted on Tuesday, but the US has remained silent on whether it launched a cyber attack as retaliation for the attacks against Sony.