Sony Network Data Breach Lawsuit. The Sony PlayStation Network lawsuit has been filed by a Canadian gamer, and charges Sony with a breach of privacy. The complaint names Sony, and its subsidiaries Sony USA, Sony Canada, and Sony Japan, as defendants. The Sony PlayStation Network hack has now grown to ensnare more than 100 […]
Sony Network Data Breach Lawsuit. The Sony PlayStation Network lawsuit has been filed by a Canadian gamer, and charges Sony with a breach of privacy. The complaint names Sony, and its subsidiaries Sony USA, Sony Canada, and Sony Japan, as defendants.
The Sony PlayStation Network hack has now grown to ensnare more than 100 million users of the PlayStation Network, Qtriocity and Sony Online Entertainment (SOE) network. Sony learned on April 19 that the PlayStation Network and Qtriocity services had been compromised, but did not inform users until April 26. On May 2, it announced that information belonging to users of the SOE service had also been accessed. The information that was hacked includes credit card numbers, addresses, user names and any other contact info.
Sony had already been named in a U.S. lawsuit, which was filed last week in a California federal court. It is seeking, among other things, monetary compensation for the data loss and loss of use of the Sony PlayStation Network and credit monitoring.
The Canadian lawsuit is seeking more than $1 billion in damages, some of which would pay for credit monitoring and fraud insurance for users of the networks. The lawsuit was brought by 21-year-old Ontario resident, Natasha Maksimovic.
“If you can’t trust a huge multi-national corporation like Sony to protect your private information, who can you trust,” Maksimovic said in a statement issued by her attorney. “It appears to me that Sony focuses more on protecting its games than its PlayStation users.”
Meanwhile, Sony is facing other scrutiny in Canada over the PlayStation Network hack. According to the Canadian Press, the debacle has prompted the country’s Privacy Commissioner to seek the power to impose “attention-getting fines” when major corporations fail to protect personal information.
“I have come to the conclusion that the only way to get some corporations to pay adequate attention to their privacy obligations is by introducing the potential for large fines that would serve as an incentive for compliance,” Jennifer Stoddart said in a speech delivered yesterday.
The Sony PlayStation Network hack has also attracted the attention of U.S. lawmakers. Members of the Congressional Subcommittee on Commerce, Manufacturing and Trade have written to only chairman Kazuo Hirai, asking him to answer 13 questions related to the security breach. The queries include questions regarding the timing of Sony’s notification to users and whether or not Sony has identified any culprits.
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