Sony delays PSN reopening

Sony has announced that it will miss its planned restoration date for the PlayStation Network (PSN). At a press event in Tokyo at the start of the week, Sony officials had indicated that they aimed to restore the PSN service by the end of this week. However, now the company says that the discovery earlier this week of the further intrusion into Sony Online Entertainment has delayed its plans. It says that the delay is because it is "taking this opportunity to conduct further testing of the incredibly complex system". Sony does not offer any new timeframe for the reopening of the services.

Meanwhile, a Financial Times report quotes what the newspaper claims are members of Anonymous saying, of the initial intrusion into Sony's PlayStation Network systems, that "the hacker that did this was supporting OpSony’s movements". OpSony was the name given to the initial denial of service attack on Sony's systems. Anonymous suspended that operation saying it would not resume "until a method is found that will not severely impact Sony customers"; it has since denied any connection with the intrusions into PSN, Qriocity and SOE systems. As was shown by the HBGary attack by Anonymous, the organisation has an amorphous existence and structure, and even the denials from Anonymous do not rule out the possibility of Anonymous members acting independently.

(djwm)