Sony calls PSN breach report 'completely false'
By
Eddie Makuch, News Editor
[UPDATE] Anonymous says it hacked PlayStation Network, potentially compromising 10 million accounts; Sony representative calls claim "completely false."
[UPDATE] Following the publication of this story, a Sony representative acknowledged Anonymous' breach claim, and refuted it.
"We’ve confirmed that the recent claim that PlayStation Network was illegally hacked and that customer passwords and email addresses were accessed is completely false," reads the statement.
Original story follows below
A since-removed tweet from hacking group Anonymous claimed today that it has breached the PlayStation Network, potentially compromising as many as 10 million accounts. Gamers may not need to be concerned, though, as Sony's business development staffer Shane Bettenhausen tweeted that the claim is "totally fake." However, much like the original Anonymous post, Bettenhausen's tweet has been deleted.
The tweet from Anonymous linked to a Pastebin page, where the author claims to hold a 50GB database with email addresses and passwords. The database gives no indication as to its origin, and appears to be a copy of a list originally posted on March 19.
As of press time, Sony had not responded to GameSpot's request for comment.
The PSN was famously hacked in April 2011, with Anonymous declaring it had nothing to do with the breach that brought parts of the online service down for months and compromised 75 million accounts.
By
Eddie Makuch, News Editor
Eddie Makuch (Mack-ooh) is a News Editor at GameSpot. He works out of the company's Boston office in Somerville, Mass., and loves extra chunky peanut butter.
269 comments
actual hacking, fake hacking claims, alike, it can only do harm, and more so to the individual customer than the so called 'evil corporations'. Yes, some companies activities can at times be abominable. The only way for individuals to force change is to 'legion' together as customers, and refuse to buy from them.
Hackers actually do my head.. as does half of the internet community.
All this power sitting at a computer just goes to their heads, so much potential to earn a decent living and yet they'd rather focus on the lol's from their fellow internet buddies.
Focus half of their time into making a career for themselves and they'd undoubtedly be successful. Sadly not though.
@Thanatos2k A tweet from some kid makes headlines these days. You want to be in the news, tweet you hacked Sony tomorrow.
Regardless if they were hacked again or not, i hope they learned their lesson from last year and encrypted all of our information.
Thankfully I don't think Sony have my CC details as I've never seen anything in the PS Store worth buying.
Hold on a second, I though Sony (like MS) "does not comments on rumors and speculation." What's up with that?
3 Like This will continue until governments get serious about cyber crimes and start giving these hackers sentences on par with people getting like 100 years in jail for selling 1 gram of crack. If these nerds start facing a real threats of getting sent to butt rape prison for the rest of their life they'll think twice before doing this stuff.
6 Like @Senor_Kami I'd rather the government get serious about Wall Street bankers first instead of bailing them out every time they screw millions of people out of money. These cyber hackers are nothing in comparison. Or at least the government doesn't pay them to screw people over...
@Szeiden Government shouldn't get involved because it has nothing to do with them, Sony doesn't want to lose money whether by law suits or by consumers switching to xbox or pc gaming, so it will increase its security and prevent another security breach. Airports stepped up security after 9/11 and movie theaters increased their security as well for The Dark Knight Rises, because if the consumers cant feel safe they wont buy the product.
1 Like if i were sony id try not to piss off Anonymous lol other then that i do think the guys at Anonymous need a real life maybe go out and get a real girl?
@warhawk-geeby funny thing is they do it 'for us'... that delusional thinking is what were dealing with here.
@leviathanwing I was thinking the same. Doing it "for us". Yeah.... Like hacking people's account and putting their credit card and personal details online for all to see. Thanks hackers. Thanks.
1 Like Yeah, like it didn't take them an entire week to figure out they were hacked the last time.
Anonymous trolls about hacking PlayStation Network, potentially compromising a cardboard box; Sony representative wets himself because of the customers reaction to such "news?!?"
1 Like ok if the whole thing was proven false then why keep up the article at all all it will do is cause arguments plus it not really news so they should just get ris of it
2 Like I'm on IRC for about an hour and nobody is mentioning a PS3 hack. That pastebin link has mostly mobile email address from Sweeden. Once again, Eddie Makuch is trying to make something out of nothing.
Completely false... in the same manner that Sony claimed it wasn't hacked last time... face it Sony, if you told people it was night time they'd look out the window to check.
1 Like Good to hear the news is false. I hope Sony's new security measures hold. We wouldn't want a repeat of last year.
@twyz Yeah, that's better than nothing. Still, two old games aren't enough to offset the month without online service and the inconvenience of having to change account info.
They wouldn't mention it if it were true. Besides that, how would they even know if they were hacked if this alleged hacker was only in there to record username and password information?
6 Like Fake or not this was a lesson to be learned for Sony and everyone... For Sony and other companies or whatever they must take security measures seriously and that goes for us consumers too. But the damage is done for Sony.. They lost a lot peoples trust but hey... These are hackers.. They live off of hacking into things.. And they pretty good at it too.. Its only a matter of time
1 Like The trolls have deleted the tweet now anyway. But GameSpot doesn't seem the need to update the article with that info?
This comment has been deleted
3 Like stupid hackers! whether its true or not have almost no respect for hackers as most are just evil crooks!
7 Like i never gave PSN any credit card information, and after the last hack i got infamous and little big planet for free. keep it up anonymus
2 Like @bluebird08 So true. What are they even accomplishing hacking these gaming companies, it's not like they're making a monetary gain, so what could they be protesting?
1 Like @AntiH3ro97 LulzSec if you recall did it because they thought it was funny and they were lightening the collective mood of the internet
pricks
1 Like @Xx_Kares_xX That's why we have terms like white hats, grey hats, and black hats. These guys are black hats.
1 Like @sortajan It's really pathetic and kind of sad that hackers are/have tried to hack things like the psn. If they wanted to be respectable hackers and actually.. you know, make good use of their talent they could hack into some terrorist groups computers to get information on them or, idk... use they're hacking abilities to program something constructive instead of destructive?
1 Like Hmm when the original breach ended up with Sony shutting down its servers didnt it start off with them saying in terms it wasn't a big deal?
Then bam the network is shutdown with reports of a shit ton of accounts compromised?
Blah
@Derrick79 It is possibility. That being said their PR guys coming out and saying this could cause them to get sued(again) if a breach really did happen.
I had an email made specifically for a PSN account(only use so far made it in May) get hijacked... First gmail account I ever had to reclaim because of someone hacking it.
11 Like Will those guys please get a life and hack like North Korea, Iran or Syria? Make the world a better and safer place! Or better yet, hack the accounts of Mexican drug lords and distribute the cash like Robinhood! Leave us gamers alone!
@Verhoven It's always easier to be "against the system, man!" when the "system" actually guarantees all your human rights and liberties, and invents and funds your precious toys (try to be a hacker in fucking Iran!). And sometimes even pays your bills, such as in the UK.
(Sorry UK friends for the jab, but you know it's true. Your compensation/social security system is insane. I know people who have enough money to buy a new car every year and is still living off your taxes in London. And you know what's worse? I'm Brazilian. I'm talking about a *foreigner* in there. You pay for her to do drugs, travel to China, pretend she's a DJ and make nude modelling. I'd denounce her if I knew how.
I'm pretty sure many of these people 'protected' by social security are either part of or enamored of Anonymous.)
2 Like @Verhoven They tried to mess with the Mexican cartels once... but then shit got too real for them. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/04/anonymous-mexican-drug-cartel-plan
@gazza_gamerNZ Or they got too talkative. Aren't they supposed to be Anonymous and not brag about it?
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