Sony’s Online Entertainment service goes offline after another hack
The Internet security crisis confronting PlayStation Network users has gotten worse than expected as Sony revealed on Monday additional 25 million clients stolen by hackers.
This is the second wave of the reported massive breach for Sony which has kept its Sony PlayStation Network offline for nearly two weeks as it investigates a computer infringement.
Sony took a second gaming network offline on Monday upon reports that banking and credit card information of more than 23,000 customers outside United States may have been compromised.
Sony’s No. 2, Kazuo Hirai, said necessary measures were done to prevent another online theft in the company’s hope to redeem its blemished image and reassure gamers who are switching to Microsoft’s Xbox.
The Sony Online Entertainment network is temporarily offline, Sony said Monday. Accounts of online gamers of EverQuest, Star Wars Galaxies and Matrix Online are possible additions to the 77 million accounts that may have been infringed since last week.
A San Diego spokesman for the online games said names, addresses, emails, birth dates phone numbers and other information from 24.6 million PC games customers were stolen from its servers as well as an "outdated database" from 2007, around 1:30 am Pacific time on Monday.
"They are hackers. We don't know where they're going to attack next," Tokyo-based Sony spokeswoman Sue Tanaka said. Tanaka added that Sony has taken all precautions including firewalls to keep its security intact.
Sony declined to show in person in front of a U.S. congressional hearing last Monday. Top officials responded in a letter to all questions on how consumer private data is protected by businesses in a letter which was sent on Tuesday, said a spokesman for Rep. Mary Bono Mack. Mack is a Republican Congresswoman from California who is leading the trial.