Sony boss Sir Howard Stringer says Sony acted quickly over PSN crisis
Sony CEO Sir Howard Stringer has hit back at critics, defending Sony's handling of the PlayStation Network security breach that saw hackers make off with millions of users' personal data.
Sony's PlayStation Network service is starting to get back on its feet after the theft of over 100 million users' personal data, and several weeks of subsequent downtime. Now Sony CEO Sir Howard Stringer has bullishly defended Sony's treatment of the crisis, protesting that the company actually responded quickly to the data breach.
"Most of these breaches go unreported by companies," Stringer said, according to Reuters. "Forty-three per cent [of companies] notify victims within a month. We reported in a week. You're telling me my week wasn't fast enough?"
The comments are a stark departure from Stringer's previous apologetic comments made while the PSN service was offline.
"This was an unprecedented situation," he added.
Sony waited a week after taking the service down before telling users the network had been hacked. It was a frustrating time for gamers, made more maddening by the eventual admission that personal data had been stolen. A faster response would've given those gamers more time to switch passwords and take other online security measures.
Stringer said his company was preparing to face the financial implications of the outage. "There's a charge for the system being down... a charge for identity theft insurance, the charges mount up, but they don't add up to a number we can quantify just yet."
According to Reuters, one expert reckons the cost could be as much as $2bn.
In other Sony news, the PlayStation Network has been subjected to another attack, this time aimed at Sony's password reset system.
What did you think of Sony's response? Were you happy with the way it communicated? Or did you feel the big S could have done more to keep users in the loop? Let us know in the comments, or on our Facebook wall.