Sony in PSN, SOE lock down after new hacking attempt

Sony have “locked-down” some 93,000 accounts after they found yet another attempt to hack their PlayStation Network, Sony Entertainment Network, and Sony Online Entertainment databases had been made.

Detecting a large number of unauthorised attempts to access accounts “using very large sets of sign-in IDs and passwords”, Sony noted intruders may have gained access to 60,000 accounts on the PSN and Sony Entertainment Network, and another 33,000 SOE accounts.

“As a preventative measure, we are requiring secure password resets for those PSN/SEN accounts that had both a sign-in ID and password match through this attempt,” said Sony chief information security officer Philip Reitinger on the official PlayStation blog.

“If you are in the small group of PSN/SEN users who may have been affected, you will receive an email from us at the address associated with your account that will prompt you to reset your password.”

Though the hackers succeeded in verifying sign-in details, no credit card information was accessed, according to Reitinger.

This latest attack follows a widespread PlayStation Network outage for Sony in April. Lasting a month, it is thought some 77 million PSN accounts and an additional 24.6 million Sony Online Entertainment accounts were compromised.