PSN- Back Online!!

Ok, I've seen a bunch of speculation of why people think PSN is down, and I thought I should just post what the community knows in comparison to what Sony is telling everyone. The truth is, there was a new CFW (custom firmware) released known as Rebug (http://rebug.me). It essentially turns a retail console into a dev console (not fully, but gives you a lot of the same options that usually dev's only have access to). Anyway, this new CFW was quickly figured out to give CFW users access to the PSN network again via the dev networks. With a little manipulation of the URL's through a proxy server you could get your hacked console back online. Not that big of a deal, right? Well, it also turns out that some people over at NGU found out that you could provide fake CC# info and the authenticity of the information was never checked as you were on Sony's private developer PSN network (essentially a network that Sony trusted). What happened next was extreme piracy of PSN content. Sony realizing the issue here shut down the network. Now, before you go freaking out about the latest information posted about Kotaku, no ones personal information was accessible via this hack. Not to say they couldn't get it, but no one is admitting to it being available. Anyway, that's the real reason for the PSN downtime. Sony is now rebuilding all of it's PSN servers to be more secure and (hopefully) make sure the CFW users cannot get online anymore.

Edit #1: To those of you saying that this is speculation, you are correct. But, it is speculation based on a lot of facts and the outcome seems to make the most sense.
1. Rebug was released on 3/31/11.
2. First guides of how to use the dev network to get back on COD games on 4/3/11. 3. Word of "shady" sites finding a way to pirate PSN content via the dev networks on 4/7/11 (basing this on posts I had to delete on the website). 4. PSN goes down on 4/20/11

Now, you can believe Sony's PR team which has kept you completely in the dark, or you can see the list of events above and come to your own conclusion. Now, this isn't the first time Sony has fought back against the PS3 modders from getting on PSN. A couple of months ago we had a utility called f*ckPSN that changed the necessary header information that was being sent to Sony to allow modified consoles back online. We were able to use it for about a month. Then came the new TOS, the mass e-mail to PS3 customers, and software update 3.56 and 3.60. So, once again, yes this is all speculation, but it is speculation based on previous actions and known facts.

Edit #2: Mathieulh just mentioned that he has been in contact with someone that has official access to the SCE devnet servers and it was posted to them today that only 3.60+ debug firmwares will be allowed on the dev network anymore. All earlier versions will be cut. If you want to retain your access you need to contact Sony and upgrade to 3.60 debug firmware.

Update on PlayStation Network and Qriocity

+ Posted by Patrick Seybold // Sr. Director, Corporate Communications & Social Media

Thank you for your patience while we work to resolve the current outage of PlayStation Network & Qriocity services. We are currently working to send a similar message to the one below via email to all of our registered account holders regarding a compromise of personal information as a result of an illegal intrusion on our systems. These malicious actions have also had an impact on your ability to enjoy the services provided by PlayStation Network and Qriocity including online gaming and online access to music, movies, sports and TV shows. We have a clear path to have PlayStation Network and Qriocity systems back online, and expect to restore some services within a week.

We’re working day and night to ensure it is done as quickly as possible. We appreciate your patience and feedback.

Valued PlayStation Network/Qriocity Customer:
We have discovered that between April 17 and April 19, 2011, certain PlayStation Network and Qriocity service user account information was compromised in connection with an illegal and unauthorized intrusion into our network. In response to this intrusion, we have:

Temporarily turned off PlayStation Network and Qriocity services;
Engaged an outside, recognized security firm to conduct a full and complete investigation into what happened; and
Quickly taken steps to enhance security and strengthen our network infrastructure by re-building our system to provide you with greater protection of your personal information.

We greatly appreciate your patience, understanding and goodwill as we do whatever it takes to resolve these issues as quickly and efficiently as practicable.

Although we are still investigating the details of this incident, we believe that an unauthorized person has obtained the following information that you provided: name, address (city, state, zip), country, email address, birthdate, PlayStation Network/Qriocity password and login, and handle/PSN online ID. It is also possible that your profile data, including purchase history and billing address (city, state, zip), and your PlayStation Network/Qriocity password security answers may have been obtained. If you have authorized a sub-account for your dependent, the same data with respect to your dependent may have been obtained. While there is no evidence at this time that credit card data was taken, we cannot rule out the possibility. If you have provided your credit card data through PlayStation Network or Qriocity, out of an abundance of caution we are advising you that your credit card number (excluding security code) and expiration date may have been obtained.

For your security, we encourage you to be especially aware of email, telephone, and postal mail scams that ask for personal or sensitive information. Sony will not contact you in any way, including by email, asking for your credit card number, social security number or other personally identifiable information. If you are asked for this information, you can be confident Sony is not the entity asking. When the PlayStation Network and Qriocity services are fully restored, we strongly recommend that you log on and change your password. Additionally, if you use your PlayStation Network or Qriocity user name or password for other unrelated services or accounts, we strongly recommend that you change them, as well.

To protect against possible identity theft or other financial loss, we encourage you to remain vigilant, to review your account statements and to monitor your credit reports. We are providing the following information for those who wish to consider it:

U.S. residents are entitled under U.S. law to one free credit report annually from each of the three major credit bureaus. To order your free credit report, visit www.annualcreditreport.com or call toll-free (877) 322-8228 .

We have also provided names and contact information for the three major U.S. credit bureaus below. At no charge, U.S. residents can have these credit bureaus place a “fraud alert” on your file that alerts creditors to take additional steps to verify your identity prior to granting credit in your name. This service can make it more difficult for someone to get credit in your name. Note, however, that because it tells creditors to follow certain procedures to protect you, it also may delay your ability to obtain credit while the agency verifies your identity. As soon as one credit bureau confirms your fraud alert, the others are notified to place fraud alerts on your file. Should you wish to place a fraud alert, or should you have any questions regarding your credit report, please contact any one of the agencies listed below.

Experian: 888-397-3742 ; www.experian.com; P.O. Box 9532, Allen, TX 75013
Equifax: 800-525-6285 ; www.equifax.com; P.O. Box 740241, Atlanta, GA 30374-0241
TransUnion: 800-680-7289 ; www.transunion.com; Fraud Victim Assistance Division, P.O. Box 6790, Fullerton, CA 92834-6790

You may wish to visit the web site of the U.S. Federal Trade Commission at www.consumer.gov/idtheft or reach the FTC at 1-877-382-4357 or 600 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW, Washington, DC 20580 for further information about how to protect yourself from identity theft. Your state Attorney General may also have advice on preventing identity theft, and you should report instances of known or suspected identity theft to law enforcement, your State Attorney General, and the FTC. For North Carolina residents, the Attorney General can be contacted at 9001 Mail Service Center, Raleigh, NC 27699-9001; telephone (877) 566-7226 ; or www.ncdoj.gov. For Maryland residents, the Attorney General can be contacted at 200 St. Paul Place, 16th Floor, Baltimore, MD 21202; telephone: (888) 743-0023 ; or www.oag.state.md.us.

We thank you for your patience as we complete our investigation of this incident, and we regret any inconvenience. Our teams are working around the clock on this, and services will be restored as soon as possible. Sony takes information protection very seriously and will continue to work to ensure that additional measures are taken to protect personally identifiable information. Providing quality and secure entertainment services to our customers is our utmost priority. Please contact us at 1-800-345-7669 should you have any additional questions.

Sincerely,
Sony Computer Entertainment and Sony Network Entertainment

The same information can be found at the following websites:

http://us.playstation.com/news/consumeralerts/#non-us

For those that live the United States, but not Massachusetts or Puerto Rico:
http://us.playstation.com/news/consumeralerts/#us

If you live in Massachusetts:
http://us.playstation.com/news/consumeralerts/#mass

If you live in Puerto Rico
http://us.playstation.com/news/consumeralerts/#pr

Q.1 When did you realise the system had been intruded?

We discovered between April 17 and April 19 there was an illegal and unauthorized intrusion into our network.

Q.2 How did you know that the system was intruded?

We watch for any issues that may be raised with respect to security and monitor for such issues both internally and externally.

Q.3 What is the main reason to this problem? Which parts of the system were vulnerable to the intrusion?

We are currently conducting a thorough investigation of the situation. Since this is an overall security related issue, we will not comment further on this case.

Q.4 What action did you take (are you taking)? Is there any possibility of further unauthorized access?

As soon as we learned of this issue, 1) we temporarily turned off PlayStation Network and Qriocity services in order to conduct a thorough investigation and to verify the smooth and secure operation of our network services, 2) we have also engaged an outside, recognized security firm to conduct a full and complete investigation into what happened, and 3) quickly taken steps to enhance security and strengthen our network infrastructure by re-building our system to provide you with greater protection of your personal information.

Q.5 How many were affected? How many per each region? What is the latest status of PlayStation Network registered account/ operating countries.

Our investigation indicates that all PlayStation Network/ Qriocity accounts may have been affected.

Q.6 Does that mean all users’ information was compromised? Tell us more in details of what personal information leaked.

In terms of possibility, yes. We believe that an unauthorized person has obtained the following information that you provided: name, address (city, state/province, zip or postal code), country, email address, birthdate, PlayStation Network/Qriocity password, login, password security answers, and handle/PSN online ID. It is also possible that your profile data may have been obtained, including purchase history and billing address (city, state/province, zip or postal code). If you have authorized a sub-account for your dependent, the same data with respect to your dependent may have been obtained. If you have provided your credit card data through PlayStation Network or Qriocity, it is possible that your credit card number (excluding security code) and expiration date may also have been obtained.

Q.7 Have you notified those users?

We are sending out e-mails directly to these users to their e-mail address registered on the PS Network accounts. Also, we have posted web notices, and additional necessary procedures have been followed by each region.

Q.8 Have you received reports or claims that their PSN ID information/ credit card had been used improperly?

Not at this point in time.

Q.9 I want to know if my account has been affected.

To protect against possible identity theft or other financial loss, we encourage you to remain vigilant to review your account statements and to monitor your credit reports. Additionally, if you use the same user name or password for your PlayStation Network or Qriocity service account for other unrelated services or accounts, we strongly recommend that you change them. When the PlayStation Network and Qriocity services are back on line, we also strongly recommend that you log on to change your password.
For your security, we encourage you to be especially aware of email, telephone, postal mail or other scams that ask for personal or sensitive information. Sony will not contact you in any way, including by email, asking for your credit card number, social security number or other personally identifiable information. If you are asked for this information, you can be confident Sony is not the entity asking.

Q.10 What should I do to prevent any unauthorized use of my (credit card) personal information?

For your security, we encourage you to be especially aware of email, telephone, postal mail or other scams that ask for personal or sensitive information. Sony will not contact you in any way, including by email, asking for your credit card number, social security number or other personally identifiable information. If you are asked for this information, you can be confident Sony is not the entity asking. Additionally, if you use the same user name or password for your PlayStation Network or Qriocity service account for other unrelated services or accounts, we strongly recommend that you change them. When the PlayStation Network and Qriocity services are back on line, we also strongly recommend that you log on to change your password.
To protect against possible identity theft or other financial loss, we encourage you to remain vigilant to review your account statements and to monitor your credit reports.

Q.11 Since when have PSN/Qriocity become unavailable and in which region?

PSN/Qriocity services have not been available since April 20 (US time) in all regions.

Q.12 How come it is taking so much time to resume the service?

We are taking the investigation seriously. We decided to keep the service down to allow us to conduct a thorough investigation and verify smooth operation of our network services.

Q.13 How serious is this? Have the hackers broken the security on PSN/Qriocity? Are you taking necessary measures to prevent such outage happening in the future?

Since this is an overall security related issue, we will not comment further on this case but we are working to restore and maintain the services, including countermeasures against future intrusions.

Q.14 When will the service resume?

We are taking the investigation seriously. We will keep the service down to allow us to conduct a thorough investigation and verify smooth operation of our network services but are working hard to resume the services as soon as we can be reasonably assured security concerns are addressed.

Q.15 Seems like SOE service was also not available/ suffering outage. Is this true? Is this due to the same reason as the PSN/Qriocity outage?

SOE's service is available although a service interruption due to an external attack did occur. A thorough investigation is ongoing.

Q.16 I want my money back (subscription fee, content) since the PSN/Qriocity was not available.

When the full services are restored and the length of the outage is known, we will assess the correct course of action.

Q.17 There seems to be some games that cannot be played even offline?

Depending on the game titles, but mainly PSN games, some may require access to PSN for trophy sync, security check, etc.

Contact Details
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Sony's PlayStation Network could return following recently enforced down time with a number of heavily requested user features.

In what would appear to be a bid to appease consumers over the service's outage, the platform holder may be planning to introduce cross-game chat and even in-game video chat "to name a few" new features.

That's according to an Engadget forum poster claiming to be a Sony Computer Entertainment employee.


"As we are rebuilding the network, we are taking into consideration in implementing features such as cross game chat and in-game video chat to name a few," they wrote on the site in response to user queries about the PSN down time.

"I cannot confirm any new features at this time but expect a massive update when the network is restored."

While this should be taken with a pinch of salt for now, the forum user in question has been posting reliable PlayStation news and info on Engadget for a number of months.

It also wouldn't be much of a stretch to believe Sony is planning to offer PSN users some sweeteners following the PR disaster over the last week, during which time the online service has been out of action following a security breach that has resulted in the theft of customers' personal data.

Analysts have suggested that Sony faces uphill struggle to regain consumer trust following the events of the past seven days.

New PlayStation 3 Models Revealed

The PlayStation 3 is getting a couple of new models according to FCC filings. The console which has seen numerous revisions over the years, will now likely get new models with improved security features to combat the widespread hacking of the device. The recent filings indicate that the consoles are identified as CECH-3001A and CECH-3001B, and these are the first new models announced since the PlayStation 3 Slim was announced and released back in 2009.

There have been no filings that suggest that any new features will be incorporated in the new models. Which furthers the argument that these new models exist solely because of the security concerns that the console has recently experienced. It is rumored that the PlayStation 3 will see a price drop of approximately $50 in 2011. Will there be changes made to the hardware to justify these price decreases? It’s unclear at this point if that’s the case, or whether this is purely a security fix.