Sony Admits Private PSN Info Has Been Stolen - All Of It

[tkioz]

Holy Crap! I'm suddenly glad medical expenses kept me from buying that PS3 last month...

 

[Venereus]

Ha, way

Good ol' hackers. Fighting for your consumer rights against the evil corporation that takes away your rights...

Oh wait they have been douchebags the whole time in this case. Nevermind. Fuck you Geohotz for probably causing all this by releasing that code. If not then you certainly encouraged it.

You mind explaining how a hack to run homebrew code on your PS3 enabled the entire security of the PSN to be compromised? Sony's horrendous security is at fault here, not hackers playing homebrew code.

The PSN was obviously prepared for stuff like this to happen before hence no massive issues like this yet.

It wasn't prepared to deal with hackers potentially having the end all be all code that jailbreaks the PS3.

PS3 owners deserve to treat their system like their PC without getting dragged into court

No, they don't get to. Deal with it.

Because a few bad apples spoils the bunch. A sad truth but look what happened here. Blame the people who would exploit it if Sony opened the doors to everyone, not Sony for trying to protect everyone's security.

Yes. they do. It's a computer, people have a right to look into how their computers work at the code level and talk about it. If they want so much control over people's property, then they can charge less for it or lease it for 10 bucks a month.

Just because people make viruses for PCs doesn't mean software engineers should be thrown in prison for figuring out and sharing how the window OS works, and you don't see car companies dragging car enthusiasts into court for cracking their car computer to tweak performance.

So yea, Sony isn't special and they're no different than any other hardware manufacturer. Deal with that. Damn kids are being brainwashed into defending some corporate bully who can't even encrypt their customer data. Not even banks let hackers get away with the entire database and they're hacked all the time.

You ever think things are better now? That they don't give people permission to do whatever they want?

It only pisses off a very small amount as most people get what they want from the functionality provided. You ever think that maybe the old ways were worse? Sure the people who love customization take a hit but its a small price to pay for the added security.

I'm not going to convince someone that has lived their entire life thinking that freedom is a given when given a new piece of technology but the times have changed.

I'm not giving up dick because some company can't do what every other damn company does and MAKE A PATCH when they discover someone found an exploit. You're a perfect example as how kids are manipulated by these lazy corporate bastards into thinking people need to give up more freedom as technology advances and finding an exploit in the company's hardware is something that needs to be punished.

Fuck that and fuck them. They can't punish people because they screw up and don't move fast enough to fix it like every other company out there. Apple doesn't prosecute jailbreakers, they just update the firmware.

Of course. Lazy corporate bastards.

Y'know they're not evil bad guys. As much as you lie to yourself they aren't actively trying to screw you over. They're trying to do what's best for everyone and the people who want stuff like you want are an extreme minority now.

I know you want to think that you're preaching one of the last hopes of a rapidly decaying videogame industry but you're not. You're just someone with another opinion.

If you were trying to run a business with unknown number of hackers always trying to be a step ahead of you and steal your products or ruin your services for their own personal gains what would you do? Keep fighting the same fight until the end of time? Because your solution isn't realistic or efficient.

If you're just going to be stubborn and only think of them as the "evil corporate bastards" then we're done here.

Alright, spit it. How much are they paying you?

 

[pokepuke]

Now, if you're done being a gigantic twat...

PCs can be legitimately/legally modified to a certain degree, enough to not be a form of cheating in PC games, etc.

With consoles, they're made how the manufacturer DESIGNED them. PCs can be custom-built. Consoles are NOT custom-built. They are made how they're meant to be used. Fucking with it is a breach of not only warranty but quality of the original product.

Guess what, duder: PC parts come with the same warranty stipulations. Also, the warranty isn't law. It's your device, you can do whatever you want with it.

 

[Belated]

Good ol' hackers. Fighting for your consumer rights against the evil corporation that takes away your rights...

Oh wait they have been douchebags the whole time in this case. Nevermind. Fuck you Geohotz for probably causing all this by releasing that code. If not then you certainly encouraged it.

How do you gather that the PSN hacking has something to do with the actions of Geohotz? Installing Linux - essentially turning your PS3 into a regular computer - doesn't necessarily lead to PSN being hacked. Now it's true that some people speculate Anonymous did this in the name of Geohotz, but remember that Geohotz and Sony settled out of court. There'd be no reason for Anon to intervene. Sure there've been a few videos released on youtube supposedly from them, but how can we know those videos are really from them? They're Anonymous after all. It could just be some prankster playing a joke. And how was Geohotz supposed to know this was going to happen?

And not all hackers can be lumped under "good" or "bad". That's like assuming all construction workers are bad just because one of them kills a man with a rivet gun one day. Some hackers might enjoy fighting for consumer rights, but some of them probably just want to steal money. Hackers are just people who know how to break into things through the internet. They're individuals. Random citizens each with their own motivations. No different than you or I. They have a skill, and they all use that skill for their own reasons.

Sure this could have been done by Anonymous, but you've gotta admit, it would be uncharacteristic of them to go this far. It could just as easily have been done by an illegal immigrant out to steal your identity.

Judging from the reports this whole thing started with custom firmware hacked onto the PS3. Something impossible without that root code that Geo released. The key wasn't for just installing Linux. It allowed for someone with a regular home console to do who knows how much stuff that they aren't allowed to do. Stuff that only developers or Sony themselves could access with a PS3.

And I never put the blame on Anon or anything. Nor all hackers in general. But they've been spearheading the effort acting like they're here to save us from an evil corporation acting against our interests when they have members with worse intentions on their side.

You don't get it. How do you know these "members with worse intentions" are really "on their side"? They could just be random hackers. Not all hackers are part of the same association. That's like thinking that Al Queda is a part of the US Army just because both groups consist of men with guns. They happen to have similar skills and weaponry, but they are not affiliated with one another.

 

[SovietX]

Luckily I only ever use PSN Vouchers.
Still pretty pissed that all this is down though.
Also, I still havn't gotton any emails from Sony explaining whats going on. A bit slack sony...

 

[SovietSecrets]

Nice secure system there Sony. Way to fuck up. At least RRoD only killed your system and didn't give out all your information at the same time.

Oh and I am still supporting the people who did this. How do you leave such a glaring issue in the system without fixing it? Thats asking for trouble. At least now Sony has to get their system together. If it didn't happen now, it was going to somewhere down the line and Sony still would have done nothing about it until then. Great company.

Wow, so you're supporting the people who could be selling people's credit card numbers right now? Also, you have no damn clue as to WHAT this issue was, or if it was even an issue to begin with. You're blaming a company for an individual that's NOT EVEN RELATED TO THE COMPANY.

If it was an issue to begin with? The stupidity of this sentence boggles me because if someone can make away with everyones information thats not an issue is it? How silly of me. I'm blaming a company who couldn't realize something of this magnitude could happen. I have said to three times now and I will say it to you. If someone makes out with a bit of information, thats normal. It happens to everyone company, happened with Valve with Half Life 2 even. Now when all of the information of every PSN user (according to the article) gets taken thats not the individual's problem for going in and exploiting that, thats Sony's problem for not realizing it. People trust their info to them and they are supposed to protect it. They failed, that simple.

 

[greenitedaze]

Okay, I have to throw in my two cents here, to everyone saying 'down with hackers' 'this is geohotz's fault' 'who supports hackers now??'

Let me clarify something for you all, Geohotz, who modified a system in order to increase it's potential did NOT enable this in anyway. Hackers in general, are not malicious, they create, they program, they aren't 'bad' at all, they help actually. Now CRACKERS on the other hand, destroy. These cyber criminals weren't hackers at all, they didn't create anything or modify anything for the betterment of it. They destroyed their way into the PSN, and retrieved sensitive information. Stop acting like you know what you're talking about when you talk about hackers, Geohotz was a hacker, or a modder to whoever wants to call him that, not a cracker. Don't act like crackers are expected to be 'better' than this either, it's called crime, and just because it's over the internet doesn't make it any less malicious.

Sorry, because I messed up because I didn't know something, I am a pretentious idiot that doesn't know what he's talking about.
Do you really think that Geohotz's leaking of the code didn't affect this at all?
Also: Hackers Hack, is hacking my info not hacking?

Ok. So if a lady got raped, and the judge ruled in favor of her rapist even though there was totally enough evidence to convict him, and then as a result, some angry women said "Because you let that rapist get away, we're going to hurt people now", and then they blew up a school building, would you blame the rape victim for that? Because by your logic, the rape victim is at fault in this case because she somehow magically provoked those women to blow up a school building.

But if we were following my logic, said woman provoked said rapist.
I see the points that you are making, and I respect it, but I feel that your comparison wasn't quite on point with what I had to say.
If this continues, I might switch to the Xbawks.

LOGIC?
Logic is not equating rape to the ps network outage!

 

[Claymorez]

Sweet mother of Odin.

This made me laugh alot and cheered me up after reading this news (I am not gonna have to go talk to the bank)

I'd like to see Sony's plans for customer retribution for this BEYOND incredible fuck up.

When they discovered the extent of the breach I wonder what that meeting was like... maybe like this:

Sony IT Guy: Well sir, we finished our forensics analysis on the extent of the data breach.

Sony Manager: Okay, so what're we looking at? Something simple like usernames, emails, possibly passwords?

Sony IT Guy: Everything was compromised.

Sony Manager: *After a pregnant pause* You mean, usernames, emails AND passwords were exposed?

Sony IT Guy: Well, THAT, and full contact information and any credit cards that they had on file from previous purchases.

Sony Manager: ...Okay. Send that report to the press department. I'm off to the Applebees bar for the 5th night in a row.

This was pretty funny too!

 

[omega_peaches]

Okay, I have to throw in my two cents here, to everyone saying 'down with hackers' 'this is geohotz's fault' 'who supports hackers now??'

Let me clarify something for you all, Geohotz, who modified a system in order to increase it's potential did NOT enable this in anyway. Hackers in general, are not malicious, they create, they program, they aren't 'bad' at all, they help actually. Now CRACKERS on the other hand, destroy. These cyber criminals weren't hackers at all, they didn't create anything or modify anything for the betterment of it. They destroyed their way into the PSN, and retrieved sensitive information. Stop acting like you know what you're talking about when you talk about hackers, Geohotz was a hacker, or a modder to whoever wants to call him that, not a cracker. Don't act like crackers are expected to be 'better' than this either, it's called crime, and just because it's over the internet doesn't make it any less malicious.

Sorry, because I messed up because I didn't know something, I am a pretentious idiot that doesn't know what he's talking about.
Do you really think that Geohotz's leaking of the code didn't affect this at all?
Also: Hackers Hack, is hacking my info not hacking?

Ok. So if a lady got raped, and the judge ruled in favor of her rapist even though there was totally enough evidence to convict him, and then as a result, some angry women said "Because you let that rapist get away, we're going to hurt people now", and then they blew up a school building, would you blame the rape victim for that? Because by your logic, the rape victim is at fault in this case because she somehow magically provoked those women to blow up a school building.

But if we were following my logic, said woman provoked said rapist.
I see the points that you are making, and I respect it, but I feel that your comparison wasn't quite on point with what I had to say.
If this continues, I might switch to the Xbawks.

LOGIC?
Logic is not equating rape to the ps network outage!

Sorry, I used the wrong word, crucify me.

 

[Flare Phoenix]

We can't log on to check what information we had on our accounts can we? I'm not sure what I had on there...

 

[MattAn24]

If it breaches the warranty, so be it, but it actually improves the quality. Why on earth would you buy a powerful computer that can only run code made by specific people, especially if there is a way to get it to run whatever code you want? I'm sorry to tell you this, but homebrew is awesome.

Because that's how it was DESIGNED to be. Not to be fucked around with like other things CAN be.

Homebrew only happened around this generation of consoles because people decided to fuck with the consoles now that they were online. The Super Nintendo, Sega Genesis.. All those retro consoles WERE NOT FUCKED WITH. They were bought and played how they were designed to be played. Because people actually RESPECTED the games industry. But no, now people just want to fuck it up for everyone else and modify shit just because they think they can.

Granted, I -have- seen SOME decent homebrew stuff that DOESN'T fuck with the console, but why homebrew stuff when other things supply it just fine? Why make it possible to play SNES games on a PS3 when the Wii is perfectly capable of doing it, while still being from the company it was designed by?

Making it possible to play SNES, etc games on a PS3 is a legal nightmare, because you're playing Nintendo games on a Sony console when you can just as easily play them on a Nintendo console with NO PROBLEM.

 

[nipsen]

At this point the only person we can definitely blame is the hack writer who posted the title to this article. This is irresponsible, sensationalist journalism, and the man should be called out for what he did: LIE about a news story to get more attention. "Admits private info is stolen" my ass.

To borrow from Orwell:

You're right.. they specifically don't admit anything, they simply tell people to panic just in case their info has been stolen - which they may or may not know about.

Sony's PR department at it's very best again.

And why would we stop them? This is too funny.

 

[Awexsome]

Good ol' hackers. Fighting for your consumer rights against the evil corporation that takes away your rights...

Oh wait they have been douchebags the whole time in this case. Nevermind. Fuck you Geohotz for probably causing all this by releasing that code. If not then you certainly encouraged it.

How do you gather that the PSN hacking has something to do with the actions of Geohotz? Installing Linux - essentially turning your PS3 into a regular computer - doesn't necessarily lead to PSN being hacked. Now it's true that some people speculate Anonymous did this in the name of Geohotz, but remember that Geohotz and Sony settled out of court. There'd be no reason for Anon to intervene. Sure there've been a few videos released on youtube supposedly from them, but how can we know those videos are really from them? They're Anonymous after all. It could just be some prankster playing a joke. And how was Geohotz supposed to know this was going to happen?

And not all hackers can be lumped under "good" or "bad". That's like assuming all construction workers are bad just because one of them kills a man with a rivet gun one day. Some hackers might enjoy fighting for consumer rights, but some of them probably just want to steal money. Hackers are just people who know how to break into things through the internet. They're individuals. Random citizens each with their own motivations. No different than you or I. They have a skill, and they all use that skill for their own reasons.

Sure this could have been done by Anonymous, but you've gotta admit, it would be uncharacteristic of them to go this far. It could just as easily have been done by an illegal immigrant out to steal your identity.

Judging from the reports this whole thing started with custom firmware hacked onto the PS3. Something impossible without that root code that Geo released. The key wasn't for just installing Linux. It allowed for someone with a regular home console to do who knows how much stuff that they aren't allowed to do. Stuff that only developers or Sony themselves could access with a PS3.

And I never put the blame on Anon or anything. Nor all hackers in general. But they've been spearheading the effort acting like they're here to save us from an evil corporation acting against our interests when they have members with worse intentions on their side.

You don't get it. How do you know these "members with worse intentions" are really "on their side"? They could just be random hackers. Not all hackers are part of the same association. That's like thinking that Al Queda is a part of the US Army just because both groups consist of men with guns. They happen to have similar skills and weaponry, but they are not affiliated with one another.

Look I can't pick which exact group they're in but they're not on Sony's. They're not on the hacker's side either because all they're doing is giving Sony more ammo for tighter restrictions but these are the consequences that comes with the hackers' side in the issue.

 

[pokepuke]

uh no...that wasn't what I was saying at all. Features like Other OS can be used to exploit Sony's network, so Sony can justify taking it down as part of protecting their network,

Yeah.... except no. That's not true in the least. Is there some kind of place you got that wives' tale from, or did it just come from your own brain?

now I'm not saying I necessarily AGREE with features being removed, as a matter of fact I don't at all, but that's how it goes. The more of a networked service gaming becomes the less we will have rights as consumers, it's unfortunate but that's the nature of a service as opposed to a sold product. In the end, If you don't want to play by Sony's rules no ones forcing you to play the game. As for things like PS2 backwards compatibility being removed, that one is pretty obvious, they realized the PS2 was still sellin' like hotcakes.

Ok, so you go on about network services and whatnot, which is also off the mark by the way, but then the whole time the topic is still really about the physical console. Please try to be coherent in the future.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

If it breaches the warranty, so be it, but it actually improves the quality. Why on earth would you buy a powerful computer that can only run code made by specific people, especially if there is a way to get it to run whatever code you want? I'm sorry to tell you this, but homebrew is awesome.

Because that's how it was DESIGNED to be. Not to be fucked around with like other things CAN be.

Homebrew only happened around this generation of consoles because people decided to fuck with the consoles now that they were online. The Super Nintendo, Sega Genesis.. All those retro consoles WERE NOT FUCKED WITH. They were bought and played how they were designed to be played. Because people actually RESPECTED the games industry. But no, now people just want to fuck it up for everyone else and modify shit just because they think they can.

Granted, I -have- seen SOME decent homebrew stuff that DOESN'T fuck with the console, but why homebrew stuff when other things supply it just fine? Why make it possible to play SNES games on a PS3 when the Wii is perfectly capable of doing it, while still being from the company it was designed by?

Making it possible to play SNES, etc games on a PS3 is a legal nightmare, because you're playing Nintendo games on a Sony console when you can just as easily play them on a Nintendo console with NO PROBLEM.

So I take it you've never had an mp3 player with crappy firmware, or a wii, a tv, and a computer with some audio/video files that you want to get to the TV, but no direct way of connecting the two? Here's my stance: It's my hardware, I bought it, I paid for it, I can do what I want with it. If I want to make it do something outside of its intended purpose, that's on me -- and good on me if I manage to do it. Few things piss me off more than people who willingly give away their ownership rights to the people they purchased their property from.

Edit: and the reason it didn't happen before this gen (or, more accurately, last gen; Xbox homebrew was a big thing, too) is because hardware in previous generations didn't have the permanent memory needed to make jailbreaking it worthwhile. Your examples of SNES and Genesis homebrew not happening wasn't because people respected the systems, it was because it wasn't possible for the average person. Just making the cartridges needed to do homebrew on those systems was so expensive that it rarely happened outside of commercial piracy operations. Current gen systems? Well, let's just say that I modded my Wii with an SD card, and my mp3 player by dragging and dropping a few files and running one program. Those examples in the above text really happened.

 

[Nurb]

Also, just a reminder for people defending these people who don't give a damn about protecting unencrpted customer data and harass people that point out exploits:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_rootkit_scandal

 

[Bakuryukun]

Anyone who gets money stolen should take Sony to court.

Or....just change all there passwords like they should be doing periodically anyways, and alert there banks that your credit card info may have been leaked so that they can keep an eye out for oddities in your statements. This actually still isn't a big deal at all.

Of course they should do that, but it's not the consumer's responsibility if Sony loses basically all of the data they have to a hacker. If my identity gets stolen because I gave it to a source that was supposedly secure but failed, Sony has to own up and at least pay back my stolen money.

That would be unnecessary, considering banks can usually reimburse you for money taken via ID fraud, it happened to me once, and to be quite honest so long as your prepared, it's actually a quite easy fix.

Sony will pay in the sense that it will get declining consumer support, that alone will probably be enough to kick their ass in gear.

Very true on all points, but it can be difficult to prove to a bank that ID was stolen, or at least what was bought with stolen data, and it's still more of Sony's fault than a bank.

I certainly agree with you there it certainly is more on Sony's head than anyone else, but I think as annoying as it may be, your still better off to go work it out with your bank instead of taking on the Gigalith that is Sony. You would probably lose more money than you would gain, all to prove a point that Sony essentially already feels, they know they screwed up but bad.

 

[Venereus]

Oh and the lesson here kiddies is that if you give any data to anyone for any reason there is a chance it will be compromised.

Not really a lesson, how the hell do you suggest we buy anything then?

That's exactly the point! It's about time people realize they're consuming ways are fucked up.

In what way? would you prefer that if you want to order something we sent off cash via the post office, or have to go to the bank and manually process the money transfer. Sony obviously just got lazy, if they changed their software regally , or had some non networked way of holding the information this would not of happened.

Back in the old days transactions didn't require personal information to be exchanged. They still don't, but people got used to capitalism and it's twisted ways. I'd take having to personally deliver money over orwellian surveillance and irrational debts.