PSN Hacked by Anonymous

The hacker hordes of Anonymous have
transferred their fickle attention to Sony. They
are currently attacking the company's online
Playstation store in retribution for Sony's lawsuit
against PS3 hacker George Hotz (aka "GeoHot").

A denial of service attack has temporarily taken
down playstation.com.

In a manifesto announcing the new operation,
Anonymous railed against Sony for going after
coders who seek to modify hardware that they
own. The lawsuits are an "unforgivable offense
against free speech and internet freedom,
primary sources of free lulz (and you know how
we feel about lulz)."

"Your corrupt business practices are indicative of
a corporate philosophy that would deny
consumers the right to use products they have
paid for and rightfully own, in the manner of
their choosing," continues the
pronouncement. "Perhaps you should alert your
customers to the fact that they are apparently
only renting your products? In light of this
assault on both rights and free expression,
Anonymous, the notoriously handsome rulers of
the internet, would like to inform you that you
have only been 'renting' your webdomains.
Having trodden upon Anonymous' rights, you
must now be trodden on."

Anonymous is rallying participants to voluntarily
contribute to the denial of service attack on
Sony. That attack is continuing, and it appears to
be far more successful than recent hits on Angel
Soft toilet paper. In Anonymous chat rooms,
participants bash Sony but worry about how
their actions will be perceived. "Guys, you need
to talk to the gamers and explain to them that
this does not affect their gameplay," wrote one.
Some even hope to take credit for a small drop
in Sony's stock price: "We're already causing
sony stock to drop!!!"

While most Anonymous attacks remain online-
only hacks or protests, Operation Sony will
feature a real world component. On April 16,
Anonymous wants people to gather at their
local Sony stores to complain in person—no
doubt leading participants to rummage through
their closets in order to dig out the old Guy
Fawkes mask.

Hacker Group Threatens Sony, PSN Undergoes Maintenance

Anonymous issues threat against PlayStation domains. [UPDATE]

April 7, 2011



http://ps3.ign.com/articles/115/1159426p1.html

Update 3: Anonymous has released another statement via its site. This time, the group states that it is suspending its attack and not going after the PlayStation Network as it would negatively impact innocent players. However, the press release goes on to state that some hackers might still be attacking the PSN, but that they're not necessarily with Anonymous. The full statement is below.



Greetings, Sony Customers And PS3 Users. We are Anonymous.
During the last few days, Anonymous has been targeting Sony for their outrageous treatment of not only PS3 users and jailbreakers, but also of the general public. Their propaganda regarding jailbreaking implies that it encourages piracy and thereby makes people lose their jobs, whereas jailbreaking actually just means you are making YOUR device do what it should do. Imagine if Microsoft forced you to use Internet Explorer instead of Firefox or Chrome. Imagine if they denied users from using any other web browser than their own. Many people would obviously be pissed... but then, why aren't you pissed at Sony?

The fact that their litigation demanded information on everyone who had viewed the material, was completely unacceptable. This is a threat not only to the gaming community, but to freedom of information in general. The fact that the privacy of individuals can be violated, simply for accessing information, and legal action can be taken for doing something with something you own, are steps far beyond the line. Anonymous decided it could not allow this to stand. If jailbreaking a phone for use of legal (unsigned) apps is found legal, why would this be any different for the Geohot case, seeing as Geohot explicitly states he does not support piracy?

Anonymous is not attacking the PSN at this time. Sony's official position is that the PSN is undergoing maintenance. We realize that targeting the PSN is not a good idea. We have therefore temporarily suspended our action, until a method is found that will not severely impact Sony customers.

Anonymous is on your side, standing up for your rights. We are not aiming to attack customers of Sony. This attack is aimed solely at Sony, and we will try our best to not affect the gamers, as this would defeat the purpose of our actions. If we did inconvenience users, please know that this was not our goal.

This operation is a response to Sony's attempt to deprive their customers of products they bought and therefore own, wholly and completely. Anonymous will not attempt to fight this by following the exact same course of action. We have plenty of tricks up our sleeves.

As a last point, we would like to point out that different operations are "run" by different people. Those who are involved in the organisation of OpSony, are not necessarily those involved in that of SonyRecon. Anonymous Operations are generally independent efforts, and it would be a mistake to assume that the same individuals are responsible for every action taken. Anonymous is comprised of people with diverse points of view, of which not all coincide with one another.

That being said, our campaign against Sony and others that would trample on the idea of free information will continue, until we are satisfied with the outcome.

WASHINGTON/BOSTON, May 4 (Reuters) - Sony Corp (6758.T) blamed the well-known Internet vigilante group Anonymous for indirectly allowing a hacker to gain access to personal data of of more than 100 million video game users.

"Sony now faces a large-scale cyber-attack involving the theft of personal information," Kazuo Hirai, chairman of the board of directors of Sony Computer Entertainment America LLC, said in a letter to members of the U.S. Congress.

"What is becoming more and more evident is that Sony has been the victim of a very carefully planned, very professional, highly sophisticated criminal cyber attack designed to steal personal and credit card information for illegal purposes," he added in the letter to members of Congress who have launched an inquiry into the matter.