clock menu more-arrow no yes mobile

Filed under:

PlayStation Network slowly coming back to life after hack attack (Update)

Owen S. Good is a longtime veteran of video games writing, well known for his coverage of sports and racing games.

Sony says the PlayStation Network is gradually restoring all services, following a two-day hacker siege on the gaming network.

Update: PlayStation Network still is struggling to return to a fully functional state. Today the PlayStation Blog posted this statement:

The video game industry has been experiencing high levels of traffic designed to disrupt connectivity and online gameplay. Multiple networks, including PSN, have been affected over the last 48 hours. PSN engineers are working hard to restore full network access and online gameplay as quickly as possible.

From time to time there may be disruptions in service due to surges in traffic, but our engineers will be working to restore service as quickly as possible.

If you received a PlayStation console over the holidays and have been unable to log onto the network, know that this problem is temporary and is not caused by your game console. We'll continue to keep you posted on Twitter at @AskPlayStation and we'll update this post once the problems subside.

Thanks again for your patience.

Early this morning, PlayStation's official support account tweeted this:

The official support page still lists the network as down. However, a reporter was able to connect with a PlayStation 3 (but not a PlayStation 4) this morning.

Xbox Live returned yesterday, and its status page currently says all core services are up and running.

Both networks came under attack on Christmas Day. The hacker group that, in August, tweeted a threat that diverted a flight carrying the president of Sony Online Entertainment is claiming responsibility, but that is unverifiable.

The Daily Dot yesterday published an interview with the hacker(s) claiming to be behind this attack. They claim the onslaught is meant to highlight poor network security at both Xbox Live and PlayStation Network. "If I was working [at Microsoft or Sony] and had a big enough budget I could totally stop these attacks," one boasted to The Daily Dot.