Sony has fallen victim to a third cyber attack against its Playstation network, while the Japanese IT giant's chief executive officer has confirmed that a date for the restoration of the network is yet to be set.
Stringer said the company was sorry for the original security breach which affected some 24.6 million Sony Online Entertainment network accounts, but reassured users that there was no evidence of any credit card information being stolen.
“To date, there is no confirmed evidence any credit card or personal information has been misused, and we continue to monitor the situation closely,” Stringer wrote in a post on Playstation's official site. “We are also moving ahead with plans to help protect our customers from identity theft around the world.”
The news of the attack was revealed on Thursday, when Reuters reported that Sony was hit by a third online attacks where the names and email addresses of 2500 users were compromised and posted onto a website.
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The blog post also detailed plans for a 'Welcome Back' package which would be made available to all users once the network was running again.
“We will be offering a ‘Welcome Back’ package to our customers once our PlayStation Network and Qriocity services are up and running,” he wrote.
“This will include, among other benefits, a month of free PlayStation Plus membership for all PSN customers, as well as an extension of subscriptions for PlayStation Plus and Music Unlimited customers to make up for time lost.”
Rumours of the upcoming attack were reported over the weekend, with CNET revealing it had received an anonymous tip from hackers that the third wave of attacks would be in retaliation for its handling of the PlayStation Network breach.
Stringer wrote that Sony’s ongoing investigation would be backed up by an upgrade of its security systems.
“Our investigation is ongoing, and we are upgrading our security so that if attacks like this happen again, our defenses will be even stronger.”
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