PlayStation limping back
By Asha

Sony’s Playstation.com is among the most visited 1100 websites in the world.  The gaming site gets most of its traffic from USA following by Japan and UK.  Italy and India make up the remaining top 5 positions.  Due to a sophisticated hacking attack, the Sony Playstation Network has been crippled for more than 1 week.

Sony has announced that some PlayStation Network and Qriocity Services will be available This Week

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Sony Computer Entertainment (SCE) and Sony Network Entertainment International (SNEI) announced they will shortly begin a phased restoration by region of PlayStation Network and Qriocity services, beginning with gaming, music and video services to be turned on. The company also announced both a series of immediate steps to enhance security across the network and a new customer appreciation program to thank its customers for their patience and loyalty.

Following a criminal cyber-attack on the company’s data-center located in San Diego, California, U.S.A., SNEI quickly turned off the PlayStation Network and Qriocity services, engaged multiple expert information security firms over the course of several days and conducted an extensive audit of the system. Since then, the company has implemented a variety of new security measures to provide greater protection of personal information. SNEI and its third-party experts have conducted extensive tests to verify the security strength of the PlayStation Network and Qriocity services. With these measures in place, SCE and SNEI plan to start a phased rollout by region of the services shortly. The initial phase of the rollout will include, but is not limited to, the following:

•Restoration of Online game-play across the PlayStation3 (PS3) and PSP (PlayStationPortable) systems
-This includes titles requiring online verification and downloaded games
•Access to Music Unlimited powered by Qriocity for PS3/PSP for existing subscribers
•Access to account management and password reset
•Access to download un-expired Movie Rentals on PS3, PSP and MediaGo
•PlayStationHome
•Friends List
•Chat Functionality
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Sony has also ramped up its security as millions of customer records, including credit card details, were compromised in the attack.

(Techgoss had published the following on April 27, 2011)

Sony hacking gets worse
By Asha

Sony’s Playstation.com is among the most visited 1100 websites in the world.  The gaming site gets most of its traffic from USA following by Japan and UK.  Italy and India make up the remaining top 5 positions.

For the last few days, the PlayStation network has been down.  After investigating it for a few days, Sony announced on April 25 that their system was not functioning well due to an ‘external intrusion’.  External Intrusion is a polite way of saying we have been hacked.

A day later, on April 26, Sony said it was not sure when the PlayStation Network would function normally.

It only gets worse.  On April 27, Sony announced that millions of Credit cards may have been compromised

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Although we are still investigating the details of this incident, we believe that an unauthorized person has obtained the following information that you provided: name, address (city, state, zip), country, email address, birthdate, PlayStation Network/Qriocity password and login, and handle/PSN online ID. It is also possible that your profile data, including purchase history and billing address (city, state, zip), and your PlayStation Network/Qriocity password security answers may have been obtained. If you have authorized a sub-account for your dependent, the same data with respect to your dependent may have been obtained. While there is no evidence at this time that credit card data was taken, we cannot rule out the possibility. If you have provided your credit card data through PlayStation Network or Qriocity, out of an abundance of caution we are advising you that your credit card number (excluding security code) and expiration date may have been obtained.
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(Techgoss had published the following on April 26, 2011)

Playstation still down
By Asha

Sony’s Playstation.com is among the most visited 1100 websites in the world.  The gaming site gets most of its traffic from USA following by Japan and UK.  Italy and India make up the remaining top 5 positions.

For the last few days, the PlayStation network has been down.  After investigating it for a few days, Sony announced on April 25 that their system was not functioning well due to an ‘external intrusion’.  External Intrusion is a polite way of saying we have been hacked.

Gamers worldwide are frustrated but Sony is unable to give a date when their PlayStation Network would function normally.  On April 26, Sony released the following to all media

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I know you are waiting for additional information on when PlayStation Network and Qriocity services will be online. Unfortunately, I don’t have an update or timeframe to share at this point in time.

As we previously noted, this is a time intensive process and we’re working to get them back online quickly. We’ll keep you updated with information as it becomes available. We once again thank you for your patience.

- Posted by Patrick Seybold // Sr. Director, Corporate Communications & Social Media
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