Thursday, April 28, 2011

Hacker steals data of 77 users online milionidi Sony

Names, birth dates, addresses, zip codes, passwords, e-mail, bill payment history and perhaps credit card numbers. These are the personal details of 77 million customers of the services of the Sony Playstation Network Qriocity and ended up in the hands of a hacker. 'S why the company has suspended all activities since 19 April, making it known, however, only yesterday the extent of the theft.

Violated the platform is a network of online console that connects millions of users, who can play for free thanks to the Internet and chat with each other, but also rent movies on TV. It is estimated that only in Italy could be about one and a half million registered users of the network, of which about 70 percent are regulars.

At the moment no one knows for sure how it was possible for hackers to steal so many personal details. One of the most likely hypothesis is that the perpetrators have taken control of some of the machines with administrator access privileges to sensitive information to users. The main concern is now to understand the extent to which the data have been violated.

Sony, in its official statement, said that "there is evidence of theft of credit card data, but does not feel excluded it. "At the moment - the statement from Sony - the caution is a must, we must warn everyone that it is possible that the hacker has obtained credit card numbers and expiration date, but not the security code ".

According to the company Japan's credit card information would in fact remain encrypted, and thus probably not readable for those who broke into the network. But when in doubt and waiting for official confirmation, security experts recommend users to pause your bank credit card registered on the network or monitor the complaints; change the password for your e-mail address used for registration and pay attention to scams in which personal data are requested.

According to reports from the blog of Sony, the technicians are at work and the services could be restored within the week "Our employees - can be read on the PlayStation Blog - have been working day and night to restore functionality as soon as possible, and we expect to be able to make available some of the services within a week.

However, we want to clarify beyond doubt that restoring the services only when we are certain that your network is secure. " The Japanese company has engaged a large company that deals with security to get to work to open an investigation on what happened. "We have taken several immediate steps to increase the protection of your personal information.

Looking beyond, we are giving away a number of measures that will significantly improve all aspects of the PlayStation Network and security of your personal information, including the movement of our network infrastructure and data center to a new site more secure, which is already in progress, "says the company Japan.

But the assurances were not used to protect the Sony by a predicted fall in the stock market. The securities, which have now reached an intraday loss of more than 5% to its lowest since mid-March, have discounted the possibility of a total possible damages that could reach $ 1.5 billion share What is alleged to society is the lack of clarity in communications and in indicating the points of violation, which is essential when it comes to intrusions and data theft.

In Italy the ADOC, the Association for the Defence of Consumers and orientation does not exclude a class action with the intention to request an account waiting for Sony to salty, and the disservice to the probable theft of data and the risk of cloned credit cards. One law firm has filed a case in California on behalf of consumers and asked the court to certify the case as a class action.

Even in Britain, an authority of government has already opened an investigation to see if Sony has violated the law that need to safeguard personal information. Valentina Arcovito

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