Sony's Howard Stringer Apologizes for Data Breach

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Sony CEO Howard Stringer apologized for “inconvenience” and “concern” generated by the recent large data breaches.

In an official Sony blog post, Stringer said late last week the company was working on restoring full and safe service as soon as possible.

The breach may have compromised personal information from over 100 million online gaming accounts, according to a report from The Associated Press.

“As soon as we discovered the potential scope of the intrusion, we shut down the PlayStation Network and Qriocity services and hired some of the best technical experts in the field to determine what happened,” Stringer said. “I wish we could have gotten the answers we needed sooner, but forensic analysis is a complex, time-consuming process. Hackers, after all, do their best to cover their tracks, and it took some time for our experts to find those tracks and begin to identify what personal information had — or had not — been taken.”

TechZone360 reports that Data Forte will work with the F.B.I. to investigate the security breach. In addition, Sony hired Guidance Software and Protiviti, which is a risk assessment firm, Reuter’s reports. Lawyers from Baker & McKenzie are also helping in the investigation.

Last week, Sony said that names, addresses, e-mails, birth dates, phone numbers and other private information from 24.6 million Sony Online Entertainment accounts could have been taken from company servers or from an old database, according to TechZone360.

 Last month, a hacker attack on the PlayStation Network may have caused the stealing of data from 77 million user accounts, TechZone360 adds.

“The resources of this company have been focused on investigating the entire nature and impact of the cyber-attack we’ve all experienced and on fixing it. We are absolutely dedicated to restoring full and safe service as soon as possible and rewarding you for your patience,” Stringer said.

As of late last week, Sony said that there was “no confirmed evidence” credit card or personal data was “misused.”

Once PlayStation Network and Qriocity services are available, customers will get a month of free PlayStation Plus membership, as well as an extension of subscriptions for PlayStation Plus and Music Unlimited customers.

Also, U.S. PlayStation Network and Qriocity customers will each get $1 million in identity theft insurance. Similar insurance will be offered for users in other locations, Sony said.




Ed Silverstein is a TechZone360 contributor. To read more of his articles, please visit his columnist page.

Edited by Jennifer Russell
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