if it was winter this would REALLY svck. but yeah, live in the moment and psn will be back before you know it.

Luckily the game only gets released May 20th here in South Africa

If I ever saw one of these hackers face to face....

I hope its already been brought up that the quote is actually "FULLY online by May31st." Different features (Gaming, PS Store, etc) will all be brought up in a rolling fashion. With some features having higher priority than others.

What? This wouldn't be an issue if Sony wasn't terrible at network security. Companies that retain and store customers personal information have an obligation to keep that information safe and to provide uninterrupted service to their customers: Sony allowed a fairly easily-spotted flaw to be exploited, thus exposing hundreds of thousands of customers and employees private information. Sony failed fantastically, here. While the hackers do have fault, the full extent of this crash lies at Sony's feet.

they are blaming it on anon but there is almost no clue who did it.

So your saying its okay for hackers to hack, as long as long as Sony's security needs to be breached?

Sony would not NEED a better security network if the Hackers hadn't attack. They could have fixed the problem themselves so that your information would have been better protected in time, but the Hackers exploited them before they had a chance.

Who is to say they weren't already attempting to fix the flaw?

This is not the right way to go about proving to Sony that they need to update. Sure, Sony is at fault, but the full extent of this crash lies at the hackers feet.

So I guess New Orleans didn't NEED better levies if Katrina hadn't hit?

And it doesn't matter if they were trying to fix the flaw, that flaw should never have existed in the first place. In today's info-centric age, where information and the means to get it are a dime-a-dozen, you don't take customers credit card information without first having a secure network. If Sony gets off easy on this because they can blame, "the hackers", other companies will get off just as easy. "Oh, it was the hacker's fault, we did everything we could"; that's a lie and everyone knows it. Network security, the internet as a whole, is a pretty new thing - people don't always know what to do with it in regards to customer security, and that's fine. What is not fine is doing nothing* and treating your network as if there is enough knowledge about networks to transfer the blame from your [censored] network design over to some malicious group, as if there is an established norm in network security. The truth is, if your company is not utilizing the constant stream of network innovations to safekeep your customers information, your company is not doing enough.

*Sony, now, obviously isn't doing nothing. Before this, though, I'm willing to bet they were doing absolutely nothing in regards to this specific flaw. Probably because they didn't even care to know about it.

The longer this takes, and the more I hear about it, the least I am pleased with Sony's answer and their stand. They claim Anonymous has stolen user details? Actually, while this may very well be their official stand, this doesn't look like the real reason the network is down, especially considering the increasingly numerous rumours that, strangely enough, match the original idea I had as to what might be a possible 'alternate' explanation...

What if they didn't access any data, what could possibly have prompted Sony to pull the network down? Early rumours pointed to retaliation by Anonymous for Sony's action suit against the first hackers who managed to get trough the PS3 security and get a custom OS image installed. My assumption was that the possible reply had everything to do with hacking the PS3 itself, not the network. Why? Because Sony's reaction showed that hacking the machine MUST have opened a breach on their network. And the likely culprit?

The PSNStore.

How does it actually work? I'm not sure, but I assumed that the store itself doesn't validate transaction history before allowing a download... Suppose you make a purchase and then try to download the associated file, who confirms that you HAVE paid for it? The file server, or your machine? Does your station contact the file server, which then confirms your previous transactions history and validates that you are entitled to the file, or does your machine do the verification first and THEN, once it has confirmed you have a right to download the file, contact the file server?

That second hypothesis (I'll say hypothesis since I don't know how it works) seems very probable, considering the current situation. What did a breach of the machine's security do? Make it possible for the hackers to download files without actually paying for them!

And Sony won't have that, of course! They took the PSN down because they realized it required an update. A MAJOR update. And it appears that this will take longer than originally expected. I assume they've encountered more setbacks then expected; after all, they have to make sure the update is compatible with the current build on users' stations (or, if not, also code an OS update they'll be pushing out when the network is back up), make sure no previous title suddenly stops working as a result of said update (not sure if that could happen; are there titles that let you order DLC straight from within the game?), etc...

So, overall, this looks like poor network architecture design from the get go, NOT a user database hack. Don't go blaming Anonymous too early. And remember, once PSN is back up, if they push an OS update down your throat to be able to log back on, assume Sony were lying all along.

if u hate them so much, get and x-box

1.) A file was found planted on the Playstation Server titled; "Anonymous: We Are Legion". So yea...could be ANON.
2.) Online play is supposed to be back up this week, we'll see how that goes though.
3.) I'm am so angry at Sony. Not as angry as the people who comment saying "I is gon switch to XBOX."

Yeah, this should be in Community Discussion, sorry guys.
Ignore this.
This hasn't been mentioned on the site.
They hope to have online play up first, everything else comes after.

While your hypothesis may hold water. My issue is with this. Sony has ALWAYS forced you to update to allow online play, so doing so to play online again would be nothing new.

Oh I'm not saying don't download the file, I'm just saying that if they push a file, this hypothesis gets even more credence...

This whole thing with Sony reminds me of the Nuclear crisis after the tsunami hit. It's like they don't want to admit they messed up. We'd be more forgiving if they were just up front with us from the beginning

So when I get my preordered copy of BRINK can I still play it even though PSN is still down?!

yeah, apparently you can rank up and gain experience when playing offline.

Aww... I feel sorry for you :/ Here you go :turtle: