Sony begins partial PlayStation Network operation

Sony said personal data, including credit card numbers, may have been stolen. But the company said Sunday it had not received any reports of the stolen information being used illegally.

Kazuho Hirai, chief of Sony Corp.'s PlayStation video game unit, said in a statement that the company has beefed up security measures to protect customers' personal data.

While the partial service allows users to enjoy video games and online chat, Sony said consumers still cannot buy video games or other content by using credit cards.

"While we understand the importance of getting our services back online, we did not rush to do so at the expense of extensively and aggressively testing our enhanced security measures," Hirai said.

Among the 100 million user accounts, Sony said about 92 million can access the limited PlayStation network service.

TOKYO – Sony began restoring its PlayStation Network service in the United States and Europe on Sunday after shutting down the service almost a month ago due to a massive security breach affecting over 100 million online accounts.

Restored operations are mainly limited to online gaming, chat and music streaming services. Sony said it aimed to fully restore the PlayStation Network by the end of May.

Sony also began Sunday a phased restoration of its Qriocity movie and music services which share the PlayStation Network's server, said Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. spokesman Satoshi Fukuoka.

Limited services will also resume in Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the Middle East, and Sony said it will start restoring the service for users in Asia soon.

Sony's PlayStation network is a system that links gamers worldwide in live play. Sony shut it down on April 20 after discovering a hacker attack.

The network serves both the PlayStation video game machines and Sony's Qriocity movie and music services. It is a system that also allows users to upgrade and download games and other content.

Sony spokesman Sosuke Kamei said the company's probe into the hacker attack was ongoing. He declined to give details on the investigation.

Sony was under heavy criticism over its handling of the network intrusion. The company did not notify consumers of the breach until April 26 even though it began investigating unusual activity on the network from April 19.

Last month, U.S. lawyers filed a lawsuit against Sony on behalf of lead plaintiff Kristopher Johns for negligent protection of personal data and failure to inform players in a timely fashion that their credit card information may have been stolen. The lawsuit seeks class-action status.

Since the shutdown of the PlayStation Network on April 20, Sony's share price has dropped nearly nine percent to close at 2,241 yen ($28) on Friday.

Hackers used Amazon server for Sony attack

New York: Amazon.com's web services cloud-computing unit was used by hackers in last month's attack against Sony's online entertainment systems, according to a person with knowledge of the matter.

Hackers using an alias signed up to rent a server through Amazon's EC2 service and launched the attack from there, said the person, who requested anonymity because the information is confidential. The account has been shut down, the person said.

The development sheds light on how hackers used the so-called cloud to carry out the second-biggest online theft of personal information to date. The incursion, which compromised the personal accounts of more than 100 million Sony customers, was "a very carefully planned, very professional, highly sophisticated criminal cyber attack," Sony has said.

Drew Herdener, a spokesman for Seattle-based Amazon, declined to comment.

Investigation

"We're continuing to work with law enforcement in an ongoing investigation into the situation," said Patrick Seybold, a US spokesman for Tokyo-based Sony. "As such, we will not comment further on this matter."

The hackers didn't break into the Amazon servers, the person said. Rather, they signed up for the service just as a legitimate company would, using fake information.

Even so, the breach at Amazon is likely to call attention to concerns some businesses have voiced over the security of computing services delivered via others' remote servers, referred to as cloud computing.

Cloud security is Amazon's top priority, Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos said at an event sponsored by Consumer Reports magazine this week.

"Data security is one of these great dynamic situations where the bad guys get better, and the good guys have to keep getting better too — it's not a static situation," Bezos said, Fast Company's website reported.

"I don't think this is ever going away — it's like trying to say that you're going to get crime to go away."

Cyber security

The use of a hijacked or rented server to launch attacks is typical for sophisticated hackers. The proliferation of server farms around the globe has made such misdirection easier, said E.J. Hilbert, president of the security company Online Intelligence and a former FBI cyber-crime investigator.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation will likely subpoena Amazon, or it may try to obtain a search warrant, Hilbert said. "The subpoena will give law enforcement a history of the transactions," or who had access to the specific internet address at that time, Hilbert said.