Sony PlayStation Network Hacked, Our Family's Information Stolen

COMMENTARY | Sony announced that a massive breach of personal data affecting subscribers to its PlayStation gaming and media network occurred between April 17 and April 19. The breach, apparently caused by hackers, impacted users on the network which is used to play live against other players; download new games; download game updates; and also download music, movies and television shows. As Thursday, the network remained down and unavailable to users, an outage which started around April 20, before any official announcement was made.

The breach also affected Sony's Qriocity network and customers, which is Sony's version of iTunes, selling music, video-on-demand, e-books and games. Sony has not indicated how many network users were affected, but the official notification seems like a blanket warning to everyone.

I have discovered our family is personally affected by the breach as my son is a subscriber and user of the PlayStation network and his kids also use it and have sub-accounts where they have provided their own personal information. He has been officially notified via email by Sony that his information, and that of his kids, was involved in the breach.

In response to the breach, Sony issued a statement via its PlayStation Support page indicating it was taking three main steps to address the crime. Sony shut down the network until further notice, hired an outside security firm to investigate the whole incident and claims to have quickly taken steps to strengthen the network against future attacks.

The breach seems to include all user info collected by Sony, including name, address, country, email address, birthday, PlayStation Network password and login, and handle/PSN online ID. Sony also indicates stolen data may include profile data, including purchase history and billing address and PlayStation Network password security answers. The breach may even include all the detailed gameplay, history of movies and music downloaded and watched and related sales data Sony accumulates on each account.

So, very disturbingly, the personal information of my family, including my son and grandkids, and all their activities and purchases has been compromised. To be safe and protect his credit, my son must now spend a lot of time contacting the various credit bureaus to place fraud alerts on his account, changing his bank account and credit card information for the affected accounts and other actions to prevent or minimize any identity theft.

To join Sony's PlayStation or Qriocity network, users like my son must provide a great deal of personal information, along with a valid credit card and related billing information to cover the monthly charges and potential downloads. The network is believed to have about 77 million total users and generates over $500 million a year for the company.

Any company that collects this degree of information has a responsibility to its customers to protect that data, period. Sony waited a week to make the announcement, which has angered people, including our family. Sony knew of a problem on April 20, which is when it shut the network down. All support pages indicated a technical issue at that time, with no mention of a data breach.

Online gaming and other networked entertainment is fun and is part of the development of the Internet as a true entertainment source. Sony's PlayStation Network has really been one of the leaders of developing games that are really developed for network play. Sony must use the latest technology to protect its network and user data; perhaps Sony has placed too much emphasis on the performance of the gaming action and front-end user experience at the cost of the highest possible level of back-end data security.

No technology is bulletproof, and when gaming systems are networked with home computers containing possibly all your personal data, it's essential for users to also take precautions to prevent theft of personal information and minimize it when it does.

Sources:
Sony Corporation "PlayStation Network Service Outage" from PlayStation Network Support page

Nathan Layne "Sony Faces Global Legal Action Over Breach, Shares Fall" Reuters via reuters.com