Image via CrunchBaseAfter the reports of the first vicious data theft faced by Sony Corp. which after a long silence was told to be as big as the data of 77million accounts one the Sony PlayStation Network. Just again recently, on Monday, Sony Corp. has again announced that additional 24.6 million accounts are also to be added to that already huge number. With such unacceptably large number of accounts compromised and detailed information about them leaked, it is highly arguable that if there are even any accounts left with Sony to be hacked yet.
This recent data theft is not related to the previous ones, which were told to be the accounts information of PlayStation Network due to the hacking which took place last month. This new number of 24.6 million accounts was registered with Sony Online Entertainment (SOE), based in San Diego. It was mentioned in the briefing today, that to the best discovered yet, something or someone with feet entered their offices on late Sunday night. This was exactly the time when Sony had just suspended the SOE online gaming service, asserting worldwide that it has “discovered an issue that warrants enough concern for us to take the service down effective immediately.” These were obviously very ambiguous statements, however the bitter reality is revealed now.
In the press release issued by Sony Corp. from Tokyo on 3rd May, it reported said that “hackers may have stolen SOE customer information on April 16th and 17th, 2011.” The explanation was a long one, and went on saying that: “…personal information from approximately 24.6 million SOE accounts may have been stolen, as well as certain information from an outdated database from 2007. The information from the outdated database that may have been stolen includes approximately 12,700 non-U.S. credit or debit card numbers and expiration dates (but not credit card security codes), and about 10,700 direct debit records of certain customers in Austria, Germany, Netherlands and Spain.”
Furthermore, it was elaborated in the press release that the information compromised of these new 24.6 million accounts involves ther “name, address, email address, birthdate, gender, phone number, login name and hashed password.” Additionally, it was very also announced that the information of the sensitive credit/debit records had the “bank account number, customer name, account name and customer address.”
In the compensation of this next news of stolen data, this press release also added that SOE will be awarding its distressed users a “30 days of additional time on their subscriptions, in addition to compensating them one day for each day the system is down. It is also in the process of outlining a “make good” plan for its PlayStation®3 MMOs (DC Universe Online and Free Realms).” This bad news was ended with the statement indicating that more detailed information of these events will also be revealed later in time this week. It is interesting see here that this new compensation along with the previous “Welcome Back” program for PSN users, will prove to be enough for regaining the trust of the Sony gamers.
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