According to a report from the Dow Jones newswire, a Japanese regulatory official has confirmed that the nation's government hasn't given Sony approval to relaunch PSN services in the territory. The source, Ministry of Economy Content Industry director Kazushige Nobutani, says the government refused Sony's initiative to resuscitate the platform. "As of May 13, Sony was incomplete in exercising measures that they said they will do on the May 1 press conference." The details of which measures haven't been enacted yet were not released.
The source added that the government wants clearer terms on what Sony's doing to protect its users' credit card info, saying, "There were similar cases in the past that were caused by other firms, and we are asking Sony whether their measures are good enough when compared to countermeasures taken in the past."
We're telling you guys -- just put all the credit card info in a big pile surrounded by a shark-filled moat. Done!
#psn
Reactivation of PlayStation Network, completed early this morning for all of North America, is now proceeding in Europe, New Zealand, Australia, Mexico and South America, PlayStation Europe said through its official Twitter moments ago. More »
#opinion
Across North America yesterday evening, PlayStation Network returned after a 23-day total blackout. In a process spanning about seven hours, the PlayStation 3's online capabilities gradually returned state-by-state, beginning in New York and ending in Texas. As gamers rushed to message boards to verify the good news in their precincts, the news had the feel of an election night, one whose results were cheered and celebrated by all. More »
#bulletin
Shortly past midnight, U.S. Pacific Time, Sony announced that PlayStation Network service had been restored in Canada, all 50 U.S. states and Puerto Rico. PSN, down for 22 days following a massive cyberattack on April 19, continues to be restored in stages in Europe and in other regions. More »
#bulletin
Sony has begun the reactivation of PlayStation Network. The process will take several hours and will begin in the United States and Europe. A map has been posted on the U.S. PlayStation blog charting the service's restoration there on a state-by-state basis. More »
#changeyourpasswords
Sony's PlayStation Network is still down—this is day 25—but there's a sliver of good news for PlayStation 3 owners today. Sony has released new firmware for the PS3 (version 3.61) that lets users update their PlayStation Network passwords. More »
Sony execs have already apologized to PlayStation customers by way of the company's official blog and with extremely deep bows, but what's the message to game developers affected by the PlayStation Network outage? Industry Gamers has the internal memo in which they "deeply regret that this incident has occurred," but don't offer many new details. More »
#itonlydoesoffline
While the PlayStation Network security breach and subsequent downtime has had significant impact on many PlayStation 3 publishers, Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot says he expects his company's cost to be minimal. More »
#wanted
Sony is weighing whether to offer a reward for information on the hackers behind the massive PlayStation Network outage, now in its 18th day, CNET reports. Its potential amount was not mentioned. More »
#itonlydoesoffline
Reuters' Japan bureau reports that hackers uploaded data they'd stolen from Sony servers during the PlayStation breach, but that Sony quickly had the unnamed website removed. The information concerned some 2,500 users and was at least 10 years old. More »
Update 11:15am: After some followup with our Japanese correspondant (Thanks, Ittousai!) we've updated the below story. Notably, the data was not from the PSN breach; rather, it was obtained from a publicly exposed file on Sony's own website, as revealed in this tweet two days ago. It's unclear what Reuters meant when it reported that the information "had been stolen by hackers and posted on a website" that Sony subsequently removed. It appears that Sony was able to remove the data from the website because ... it was Sony's own website! While this isn't related to the PSN attack, it is similarly emblematic of Sony's overall inability to protect sensitive customer data. You'll find our original (and erroneous) report after the break.
A report from Reuters' Tokyo branch reveals that the data lifted from PlayStation Network over two weeks ago had made its way from your life to Sony's servers into hacker's hands and finally, from there, onto an unnamed website. "Sony said on Saturday it had removed from the Internet the names and partial addresses of 2,500 sweepstakes contestants that had been stolen by hackers and posted on a website," Reuters reports.
Before you fret, let's detail the data a bit: It was from customers who entered a 2001 sweepstakes (Win a Free Identity Theft!) and did not include sensitive bits like credit card numbers, social security numbers, or passwords. "The website was out of date and inactive when discovered as part of the continued attacks on Sony," the beleaguered electronics company said. It's unclear how Sony was able to remove the website as quickly as it evidently did. Late last night, Sony re-adjusted its timeline for reactivating PSN, originally expected to be back online in some form this week, citing the need for further testing.
#itonlydoesoffline
Kevin Butler, the voluble, if fake, PlayStation executive, has nearly 84,000 Twitter followers. His approval rating, if it was measured, would assuredly be sky-high among hardcore gamers. And he has been dead silent since the beginning of the PlayStation Network Outage, now in its third week with no signs of ending. More »
#thisiswaiting
If you're expecting to go online with your PlayStation 3 or PSP this weekend, you might want to make other plans. In the latest update from Sony Computer Entertainment on the status of the currently offline PlayStation Network it sounds like we're in for a longer wait than we (or Sony) expected. More »
#meaculpa
Sony will apologize to its PlayStation Network account holders in Europe by handing out free games, the company announced on its official blog today, while it sorts out the logistics of its identity theft protection program. So, what will you get, Europe? More »
#illegalintrusion
Two long-time members of hacker group Anonymous tell the Financial Times that members of the loosely organized entity are likely behind the hacking attack on Sony, despite the group's official denials. More »
#sirhowardstringer
Howard Stringer, the man at the very top of Sony, has released an open letter to customers today, joining PlayStation boss Kaz Hirai in officially apologizing for the "inconvenience and concern" caused by an attack on the company's PlayStation Network. More »
#isthisthingon
Expected to return sometime this week, Sony's PlayStation Network is still offline. But a spokesman for the PlayStation maker says the team responsible for reviving online play and other network services to the PlayStation 3 and PSP has reached "an important step towards restoring" online functionality. More »
#itonlydoesoffline
According to details from Sony themselves in a letter to congressional subcommittee, Sony was aware that data had been removed from their systems six days before warning customers that accounts had been compromised. All dates and times from Sony's missive to Congress. More »
#itonlydoesoffline
The cyber attack that knocked the Playstation Network and Sony Online Entertainment offline for more than a week was a "very carefully planned, very professional, highly sophisticated criminal cyber attack designed to steal personal and credit card information," according to a letter from Sony to members of Congress obtained by Kotaku today from government sources. More »
#itonlydoesoffline
The hack attack that forced Sony to take the Playstation Network and Sony Online Entertainment offline and resulted in the theft of personal information from tens of millions of people around the world wasn't really Sony's fault, it was an inevitability, a security expert tells Kotaku. More »
When Sony Online Entertainment announced last night that it had lost several thousand customers' credit card numbers -- though the theft came weeks earlier, during the main attack affecting Sony's PlayStation Network and Qriocity services -- something didn't add up. Sony Online Entertainment had just one week earlier specifically said that its customers data was safe, because "SOE's systems and databases are separate from PSN's." So, how did SOE customer information leak if the "systems and databases" were different for PSN and SOE?
"While the two systems are distinct and operated separately, given that they are both under the Sony umbrella, there is some degree of architecture that overlaps," an SOE rep told Joystiq this afternoon. Speaking to the method used for breaching the information, the rep told us, "The intrusions were similar in nature," indicating that the same party perpetrated both thefts.
SOE also insisted once more that "This is NOT a second attack," and that yesterday's announcement was a result of "new information" that was discovered on May 1 "as part of our ongoing investigation of the external intrusion in April." It is still unknown when service will return to SOE's games, but the company says "it will be as soon as we are 100% confident that we can resume a safe and secure service."
#itonlydoesoffline
Sony Computer Entertainment of America declined to testify at a Congressional hearing about the threat of data theft to American consumers, but will continue to work to answer Congressional questions, officials tell Kotaku. More »
#psndatabreach
In this morning's news conference, Sony Computer Entertainment head Kazuo Hirai said the company would consider covering costs associated with reissuing credit cards to PlayStation Network subscribers who feel their accounts have been compromised by the massive data breach of April 20. More »
Wondering how at risk your country is percentage-wise for theft identity due to PlayStation Network's recent breach? This handy charted tweeted by 8-4's Mark MacDonald should help break down just that for you!
Sony's US PlayStation blog tonight announced that "some PlayStation Network and Qriocity services" will become available this week as the company scrambles to build a new server home in the wake of a security breach earlier this month. Though no specific time or date is named, the post lays out a plan to "begin a phased restoration by region" of services "shortly," alongside a mandatory system update for all consoles forcing a changed in password.
With the return of servies will also come a new position at Sony Corporation: chief information security officer, a position that will report to current chief information officer Shinji Hasejima. Additionally, the company says it is expediting an "already planned move" of its data center -- a data center the post claims to have been "under construction and development for several months," despite the attacks having only occurred within the past few weeks. Sony also detailed its "Welcome Back" appreciation program a bit more thoroughly, though it still remains unclear what content the company will be offering in various regions as an apology. The full list of services returning to PSN are listed after the break.
#surveysays
Lots of people vow all kinds of extreme things when they're pissed off, especially at giant corporations. Many come back for reasons of convenience or simply calming down. But a survey taken this week, reacting to the PlayStation Network outage, suggests that 21 percent of PS3 owners are considering selling their consoles and fleeing for Xbox Live. More »
#itonlydoesoffline
Early in the morning on the U.S. east coast, Kazuo Hirai will address the devastating outage of and loss of customer data from the PlayStation Network. Hirai's participation itself sends a message. To investors, he is Sony's second-in-command. To gamers, he's one of PlayStation's principal figures, if not its face for the past five years. More »
#externalintrusion
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security has joined the FBI, Federal Trade Commission and 22 state attorneys general in investigating last week's PlayStation Network breach. That "malicious intrusion" into Sony's online network and its Qriocity service forced PlayStation owners offline and threatened the security of some 77 million accounts. More »
