Thu, Apr 07, 2011 | 06:40 BST
Anonymous ceases PSN DDOS attacks, Sony admits failures
In the wake of a declaration of war from the Internet hive mind Anonymous, Sony now concedes hackers could have been involved in recent outages – just as the hacktivist group announces it will back off from such attacks.
“We are currently investigating [the network instability], including the possibility of targeted behavior of an outside party,” a Sony spokesperson told Gamespot.
“If this is indeed caused by such act, we want to once again thank our customers who have borne the brunt of the attack through interrupted service. Our engineers are working to restore and maintain the services, and we appreciate our customers’ continued support. ”
Originally, Sony put outages on its websites and PlayStation Network services down to maintenance.
In the meantime, Anonymous has apparently decided not to pursue DDOS attacks on Sony servers.
“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,” a post on the group’s news site announced.
“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.”
Anonymous has suffered negative press over its anti-Sony operations, after reports of operations targeting Sony staff’s families. Multiple statements from Anonymous representatives have apparently sought to clarify misunderstanding of the organisation’s structure, in that the activities of individuals and cells canot be taken as indicative of sanction from the entire hive.
Sony is said to have engaged the services of anti-DDOS firm Prolexic to counter Anonymous’s earlier activities, although this has not been confirmed by an official representative.
Anonymous has Sony in its sight over the company’s suit against hackers GeoHot and Graf_Chokolo, considered responsible for the proliferation of custom PlayStation 3 firmware allowing pirated back up games.
27 comments
#1
xino
07/04/11, 5:24 am
I wonder what porn GeotHotz is watching tonight.
people should open their eyes and “fail-over”-flow with the Anonymous!
Sony think they can do whatever the fark they want.
they are not in control! we are! says Legion!:)
#2
dragonsight
07/04/11, 6:04 am
from internet tough guys to internet twats. my how anon has fallen (most of them are new fags anyway).
#3
Gekidami
07/04/11, 6:12 am
Good, they’ve finally come to their senses.
Shame they attacked the customers anyway, so their image has already taken a hit.
#4
Dannybuoy
07/04/11, 7:46 am
This is no different to terrorism no? The world has too many extremist morons right now. And don’t give me that freedom of speech/consumer rights bullshit. They are definitely a minority and they better not ruin the future for people who are happy with the status quo.
#5
Blerk
07/04/11, 8:32 am
Looks like they’ve finally realised that everyone was calling them cunts. The cunts.
#6
Zurtech
07/04/11, 8:38 am
@4
Aye was thinkin the other day their actions are starting to sound like a cyber-terrorist group and not and activist group. End of the day they’re not even fighting for consumer’s rights, they’re just fighting for the right to do what benefits themselves.
@7
Or just call themselves “Annoyance”
#7
RockTwist
07/04/11, 8:40 am
Should just rename themselves Anonymice.
#8
Amored
07/04/11, 8:49 am
“We realize that targeting the PSN is not a good idea”
No? Really? Great head work, Anon! U haz breyn pawa! OLOL… Or whatever you 4chan kiddies say…
#9
NeoSquall
07/04/11, 10:02 am
Inconsistent anonymous fuckers are inconsistent.
#10
scotjock
07/04/11, 10:25 am
Totally inconsistent in every way stinks of cyber terrorism and I hope the relevant authorities nail them.
Correct me if I’m wrong wasn’t it geohot who released an exploit for other os that then was countered by the big FU by Sony removing other Os ( I used it really handy but ultimately a bit shit) I don’t blame Sony I blame hotz.
#11
PsychoboyUK
07/04/11, 10:47 am
Sorry to go off topic folks but the IMAGE link (According to my Anti virus software) Is linking to a trojan horse :S sorry just a heads up!!!!
#12
Nozz
07/04/11, 10:58 am
Good. Thing is, we (the consumer) knew why we had the downtime while this was happening.
If they wanted Sony to look bad they shouldn’t have announced that they were going to attack before hand, it just made them look twatish.
And why in the hell should the consumer suffer in this process anyway?!
#13
Rosseu
07/04/11, 11:16 am
@11 True,
mine says JS/agent.nca trojan
#14
YoungZer0
07/04/11, 11:31 am
@11: True.
#15
Hybridpsycho
07/04/11, 11:31 am
Well durh, they sure are clever. Of course it will harm the consumers, and whatever they try to do to Sony will harm the consumers as well
Fucking idiots.
#16
Ireland Michael
07/04/11, 2:13 pm
And they’ll probably never be heard from again.
This group of idiots anyway.
Anonymous fails again.
#17
ManuOtaku
07/04/11, 2:20 pm
iam glad they had come to their senses, that saids a lot about these guys not everybody admits their mistakes specially publickly, kudos for that, and yes if you want to teach sony a lesson, which iam ok with for the other S issue, attack only sony not their customers.
#18
Cort
07/04/11, 4:59 pm
Anonymous ceased attacks not because they realised the error of their ways but because after the first wave of attacks Sony employed the services of a brilliant but relatively unknown US company called Prolexic which does DDoS defence and analysis and locates those responsible. And there’s nothing these hackers like least than having the police knock on their mom’s front door.
#19
Ireland Michael
07/04/11, 5:01 pm
@18 Did Sony really do that? Hahahaha!
#20
DSB
07/04/11, 5:02 pm
Hahahaha.
Wow, as someone said in an earlier thread, Anonymous really do work like Al Qaeda or Taliban.
They have no problem slitting peoples throats, but as soon as they realize that it actually hurts their case to actively support that, they suddenly declare that doing so is very very bad.
That’s the problem with trying run a campaign with your feelings rather than with your brain.
#21
NeoSquall
07/04/11, 5:07 pm
@18 I think it’s better if they remain unknwon then, so more anonymous hipsters can fall in their web.
#22
Ireland Michael
07/04/11, 5:16 pm
We are Anonymous.
We are Legion.
We do not forgive.
We do not forget.
Expect us.
Unless you find out our IP addresses and contact the authorities.
Then We run away like little pansies.
#23
neon6
07/04/11, 11:39 pm
I got 2 malware warning when I opened Anonymous’ news link into another tab. Can you give others a warning next time if the site seems potentially unsafe?
#24
YoungZer0
08/04/11, 12:27 am
@22: To south america, Robin, to south america.
#25
LOLshock94
08/04/11, 2:49 am
there still attacking psn its just a matter of when and how
#26
Cort
08/04/11, 10:59 am
Prolexic traced a lot of the people responsible for the recent attacks in support of Wikileaks. It’s interesting to note how their (Anonymous) change of course happened the day after it leaked (sic) that Sony had employed the services of the company.
#27
GMoney
06/05/11, 2:30 am
Of course ANONYMOUS is responsible for the data breach! Do they think anyone actually believes them? The breach just HAPPENS to be aided by the DDoS attack simultaneously? Come on, who do they expect to believe that? And of course they are going to leave a calling card. As if they haven’t done the very same thing when defacing a public website.
They purport to be about FREE INFORMATION yet they all collectively hide behind ANON?? They don’t condone theft? They are kings of WAREZ! Sorry to break this to everyone but Jailbreaking PS3 was ONLY about circumventing copyrighted games.
Enough said. They are garbage. The very dreg’s of techdom.