Spanish police arrest three alleged Anonymous 'hacktivists'

Spanish police on Friday reportedly arrested three alleged members of the hacker and activist group Anonymous on suspicion of taking part in online attacks against Sony's PlayStation network, as well as banks, businesses and government websites.

Police told reporters in Spain that the three "hacktivists," whose identities haven't yet been released, were involved in the April hacking of the PlayStation Network, according to a report from Reuters.

The attacks resulted in the online video gaming and entertainment service being suspended for more than a month before being relaunched by the Japanese tech giant recently.

Officials with Sony, which has also been dealing with attacks in recent weeks on its Sony Pictures and music websites from hackers including the group LulzSec, were unavailable for comment on Friday morning about the arrests.

The suspects -- who lived separately in the cities of Barcelona, Valencia and Almeria -- are also believed to have played a role in cyber-attacks on the Spanish banks Bankia and BBVA, as well as the Italian energy group Enel, Reuters said.

Spanish authorities have charged the three with "organizing cyber attacks against the websites of Sony Corp, banks and governments -- but not the recent massive hacking of PlayStation gamers," Reuters said.

Police in Spain, who had been investigating Anonymous' activities in that country since October of last year, also took possession of a computer that is believed to have been used in the hacks, according to a report from the BBC.

Anonymous, a group of online hackers that says it is made up of "online citizens" with no clear leader, generally launches Web attacks against companies or governments the hackers deem detrimental to society. As such, Anonymous has played a part in hacking government sites in countries such as Egypt, Tunisia and Iran.

The group has also been known for hacking the websites of banks, credit card companies and PayPal in retaliation for those companies not accepting donations made to the secret-document-publishing website WikiLeaks.

Sony has blamed the attack on its PlayStation Network partially on Anonymous, but the group has denied involvement, though it did say it is possible that individual members could have been involved on their own.

"They are structured in independent cells and make thousands of simultaneous attacks using infected 'zombie' computers worldwide," Spanish police told Reuters. "This is why NATO considers them a threat ... they are even capable of collapsing a country's administrative structure."

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-- Nathan Olivarez-Giles
Twitter.com/nateog

Photo: Sony Corp. has been under attack by hackers in recent months. Credit: Kim Kyung-Hoon / Reuters

Sony's NGP is officially named PlayStation Vita -- and will have 3G service from AT&T

Sony on Monday night offered more details on the successor to the PlayStation Portable video game system, which was code-named the NGP but will now be called PlayStation Vita.

The Vita -- vita being the Latin word for life -- will feature a 5-inch touch screen on the front of the unit and a touch pad on the rear as well, for controlling games using hand gestures. Two cameras, one on the front and one out back, will also be included in the Vita, allowing for photos as well as augmented reality gaming.

 For gamers looking forward to a more traditional way to play, two analog joysticks and standard PlayStation controller buttons remain on the face of the device, to the left and right of the Vita's screen.

Sony's Jack Tretton, who heads the PlayStation business in North America, and other officials at the Japanese tech titan were on hand at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum on Monday night for the Vita's unveiling as a part of the E3 convention, which is taking place this week.

The Times' Alex Pham was also there, covering the event for our sister blog Company Town, and noted that Sony started its show by acknowledging and apologizing for the attacks from hackers that began in April and led to the disabling of the PlayStation Network.

But while the thousands in attendance as the Sony E3 event on Monday might have welcomed the news of the Vita's impending arrival, a bit of a backlash also came when the company announced the exclusive carrier for a 3G version of the new handheld device.

From Pham's report:

Although Sony may have been able to sidestep the PSN-outage land mine, it inadvertently tripped a different bomb when it announced the service provider for the Vita. Loud boos from the audience greeted the news that Sony had selected AT&T as the device's exclusive carrier, lighting up a tinderbox of consumer resentment and frustration with the cellphone service.

Despite the sour note, Sony moved on to present a rash of game titles for the new console, which has 80 games in development from numerous developers, including Capcom, Sega, Electronic Arts, Ubisoft Entertainment and THQ.

The Vita will hit stores this holiday season for $249 in its Wi-Fi-only flavor, and $299 for the 3G/Wi-Fi model from AT&T.

For more on what games, new hardware and more details on PlayStation Network troubles, check out Pham's Company Town report.  

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-- Nathan Olivarez-Giles

twitter.com/nateog

Photo: (Top) Kazuo Hirai, executive deputy president of Sony and president and CEO of Sony Computer Entertainment, introduces the PlayStation Vita during a news conference at the E3 in Los Angeles on Monday, June 6, 2011. Credit: Jonathan Alcorn/Bloomberg

Images: (Middle and bottom) Sony PlayStation Vita. Credit: Sony

LulzSec claims to have hacked FBI-affiliated website

Lulz Security, the group also known as LulzSec that recently hacked the websites of PBS and Sony, posted a tweet Friday claiming to have hacked an FBI-affiliated website. 

The group posted a claim on the website Pastebin that it had hacked the Atlanta chapter of Infragard, a partnership between the FBI and the private sector dedicated to preventing terrorism and criminal acts against the U.S. It also claimed to have posted nearly 200 user names, saying "all of them are affiliated with the FBI in some way."

The website, infragardatlanta.org, displayed only a video that appeared to have been posted on a YouTube account related to the Internet group Anonymous.

In response to another of LulzSec's recent hack attacks, technology blog Gizmodo created a database to help sonypictures.com users find out whether their personal information was among the data leaked Friday by the hacker group.

LulzSec also published the information Friday on Pastebin, according to the Associated Press.

The Gizmodo database is about as simple as it could be; enter your sonypictures.com related email address and the database lets you know if you are among those compromised. Gizmodo also notes that the database doesn't store any of the entered text.

"This isn't stuff you want floating around, or in the hands of a nefarious stranger," said Gizmodo writers Sam Biddle and Chris Beidelman in the article containing the database search tool.

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Image: A screen shot of the home page of infragardatlanta.org taken at 6:30 p.m. Credit: infragardatlanta.org

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PlayStation Store back up and running after being down more than a month

The PlayStation Store is back online, and available to gamers using Sony's PlayStation Network -- after being out of commission more than a month.

"The PlayStation Store is back online and thank you everyone for your patience," wrote Grace Chen, the director of Sony's PlayStation Store. "You will notice a huge lineup of new downloadable games, demos, add-on content, themes, avatars and videos. Also, PlayStation Plus has been updated with new full game trials, free games and DLC, free avatars and even more discounts."

But, as Sony gamers would know, all of those updates are business as usual at the PlayStation Store.

The Welcome Back package Sony promised last month alongside ID-theft insurance isn't yet available in the online storefront. The package will include one month of free PlayStation Plus membership for PlayStation Network users and extensions of subscriptions for PlayStation Plus and Qriocity customers to make up for the time they lost because of the closure.

The Welcome Back offer is "currently in the final stages of testing and will be available to download soon; we'll be sure to let you know when," she wrote.

The delay of the Welcome Back package will no doubt frustrate many, while others might be satisfied that the Store is running again after its shutdown April 20.

On May 14, Sony relaunched its PlayStation Network service, which allows PlayStation owners to play multiplayer video games online with friends. But the return of the PSN didn't include the PlayStation Store -- which sells games, movies and other entertainment content -- until Thursday.

Sony shut down the store after discovering its servers had been hacked as far back as April 17 and that the personal information of more than 90 million customers had probably been stolen.

Altogether, the hacking of the PlayStation network has cost Sony more than $172 million, nearly as much as the company incurred in damage from the earthquake and tsunami that struck Japan in March.

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-- Nathan Olivarez-Giles

twitter.com/nateog

Photo: Sony's Playstation game consoles are displayed at an electronic shop in Tokyo May 5, 2011. Credit: Kim Kyung-Hoon/Reuters

Sony Ericsson Xperia Play, a.k.a. the PlayStation Phone, hits Verizon on May 26

Sony Ericsson's Xperia Play smartphone, which was dubbed the PlayStation Phone in rumors ahead of its official unveiling, is set to hit Verizon Wireless on May 26.

Pre-orders for the device, which features a sliding screen that reveals touch-sensitive directional pads and buttons for playing video games on the phone, begin May 19, Sony said.

The phone, which will run on a modified version of Google's Android Gingerbread operating system, will sell for $199.99 with a two-year contract.

The Xperia Play is the first "PlayStation certified smartphone," and will allow owners to download games for the device through both Google's Android Marketplace and Verizon's V Cast app store.

Seven games will come pre-loaded on the phone in the U.S.: Madden NFL 11, Bruce Lee Dragon Warrior, Asphalt 6: Adrenaline, The Sims 3, Star Battalion, Crash Bandicoot and Tetris.

More than 50 other games will be available via V Cast when the phone launches, Sony said.

Past PlayStation games will soon go on sale in the Android Marketplace, in the form of Android apps, and Sony will use Android as the OS to power its next portable PlayStation gaming console, currently nicknamed the NGP.

Sony hasn't said whether it will have the NGP, Xperia Play or future PlayStation certified phones use the recently relaunched PlayStation Network to buy games and apps, as is used on the PlayStation 3 video game console. 

The Xperia Play handset also features a 1GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon processor, a 4-inch touch screen, a 5-megapixel rear-facing camera and a VGA camera on the front for video chatting. The phone will also be able to connect to the Internet via 3G or Wi-Fi signals.

Below is a video from Sony Ericsson of the Bruce Lee Dragon Warrior game being demonstrated on the phone at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona in February.

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Image: Sony Ericsson Xperia Play smartphone. Credit: Sony Ericsson

Sony flips the switch back on for PlayStation Network

Sony on Saturday said it has started to gradually bring back its online PlayStation Network, beginning with California and some states in the Northeast.

Sony pulled the plug on its online game and entertainment network, which services tens of millions of PlayStation 3 users, when the company last month discovered that its data centers had been infiltrated and its customers' personal information most likely stolen.

Lawmakers, including Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) and Rep. Edward Markey (D-Mass.), made a fuss about the weeklong delay between the time Sony shut down its service and when it disclosed to its users that their information had been compromised.

The rebuke from policymakers prompted public apologies from senior Sony executives, including Chief Executive Howard Stringer and his heir apparent, Kazuo Hirai.

Sony has said it is working with the FBI to track down the hacker who illegally accessed its computers. A report by Bloomberg alleged that the infiltrator had rented Amazon.com's servers to launch the attack.

Meanwhile, it has been all hands on deck at Sony, whose employees have been working round the clock to reinforce its online security measures and restore the PlayStation Network and Qriocity music and movie services.

Sony said the process could take "several hours" to roll out across the country. The company has posted an online map that continually updates to show its progress in turning its services back on.

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Photo: A man walks on a Sony PlayStation logo on the floor of an electronics store in Tokyo on April 27, 2011. Credit: Reuters/Yuriko Nakao

Sony's websites may be next target for hackers, report says

Sony's websites may be the next target for hackers in what would be a third cyber attack against the consumer electronics titan, according to a report from CNet.

An unidentified group of hackers said it was planning to attack Sony's websites this weekend in response to the anger over the way the Tokyo-based company has handled attacks against its PlayStation Network and cloud-based music service Qriocity, CNet said.

The hackers allegedly discussed the planned attack on an Internet Relay Chat channel, which is a private instant messaging system used to communicate in real-time, in text, across the Web, the report said.

"An observer of the Internet Relay Chat channel used by the hackers told CNET Friday that a third major attack is planned this weekend against Sony's Web site," CNet said, not naming who the observer was.

If the planned hack succeeds, those involved said they want to publicize some or all of the data they can siphon from Sony's servers, the report said. The attacks on Sony's servers so far have exposed personal information such as names, birth dates, addresses, email addresses and even credit card information.

The hackers communicating on the Relay Chat said they already have access to some of Sony's servers, CNet said.

The move to take down Sony's websites would be one made out of retaliation due to frustration with the way Sony has handled two previous attacks on its online services so far, the report said.

The first attack came in April, against servers for the PlayStation Network and Qriocity music service. Sony shut down the two online services on April 20 after discovering it had been hacked on April 19. Neither service has returned to public operation as of yet.

A second cyber-attack against Sony took place on Monday. For the follow-up attack, the target was Sony Online Entertainment's servers. That hack forced the company to shut down that division of its business, which builds and supports online multiplayer computer games such as EverQuest and the Matrix Online.

The weekend attack on Sony's websites would be the third attack against the company in recent weeks. It is unclear as to whether or not the first two, and possibly third, attacks have been performed by the same group.

Sony has lobbed some of the blame for its problems at the "hacktivist" group Anonomyous, but the group has denied any responsibility for the attacks.

The troubles for Sony's online services has led to frustration from Congress and the U.S. attorney general's office, both of which are looking for more information from Sony about how the incidents took place and what the company is doing to protect consumers.

Sony apologized for the massive security breaches; Sony CEO Howard Stringer apologized in a letter to PlayStation users while also announcing a $1-million identity theft insurance policy for affected U.S. users.

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-- Nathan Olivarez-Giles

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Image: A screenshot of Sony.com, which could be the next target for hackers attacking Sony. Credit: Sony

Sony CEO apologizes for PlayStation Network hack, announces ID-theft insurance

Sir Howard Stringer, Sony's chief executive, president and chairman, issued an apology for the hacking of the PlayStation Network and Qriocity music service, and the resulting outage of both online services since April 20.

In a letter posted on the PlayStation Blog, Stringer also said Sony has put in place a $1-million identity theft insurance policy to cover affected users.

"I know this has been a frustrating time for all of you," Stringer wrote in the first line of his letter posted late Thursday. "Let me assure you that the resources of this company have been focused on investigating the entire nature and impact of the cyber-attack we've all experienced and on fixing it."

Stringer told service subscribers that the company will be "rewarding you for your patience."

"To date, there is no confirmed evidence any credit card or personal information has been misused, and we continue to monitor the situation closely," he wrote. "We are also moving ahead with plans to help protect our customers from identity theft around the world."

The $1-million identity theft insurance plan, which was announced in the letter, only covers U.S. users of the PlayStation Network and Qriocity, but Sony is planning announcements for other regions soon, Stringer wrote.

The PlayStation Network is Sony's online service which allows PlayStation 3 video game console owners to play online-enabled games with friends, as well as serving as a storefront to buy downloadable games, movies and music. Qriocity is Sony's subscription-based Web service which allows users to stream music from the cloud.

Sony has announced a "Welcome Back" package for affected users of both services, which is upwards of 90 million people. The package will offer one month of free PlayStation Plus membership for PlayStation Network users and extensions of subscriptions for PlayStation Plus and Qriocity customers "to make up for time lost," Stringer said.

"As a company we -- and I -- apologize for the inconvenience and concern caused by this attack," he wrote. "Under the leadership of Kazuo Hirai, we have teams working around the clock and around the world to restore your access to those services as quickly, and as safely, as possible."

Stringer also addressed concerns that Sony waited too long to notify customers of what was going on.

After shutting down the Web-based services on April 20, it wasn't until April 27 that Sony said personal information may have been accessed and on May 1, Sony said as many as 10 million credit card accounts may have been exposed to hackers in the network attack.

"I know some believe we should have notified our customers earlier than we did," Stringer wrote. "It's a fair question. As soon as we discovered the potential scope of the intrusion, we shut down the PlayStation Network and Qriocity services and hired some of the best technical experts in the field to determine what happened. I wish we could have gotten the answers we needed sooner, but forensic analysis is a complex, time-consuming process. Hackers, after all, do their best to cover their tracks, and it took some time for our experts to find those tracks and begin to identify what personal information had -- or had not -- been taken."

Stringer said Sony's investigation into just what happened is still ongoing and that the company is also upgrading its security measures to protect itself from future attacks.

"In the last few months, Sony has faced a terrible earthquake and tsunami in Japan," he wrote. "But now we are facing a very man-made event -- a criminal attack on us -- and on you -- and we are working with the FBI and other law enforcement agencies around the world to apprehend those responsible."

Stringer did not offer an exact date as to when the PlayStation Network or Qriocity would be up and running again, but said it would happen "in the coming days."

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Photo: Sir Howard Stringer, Sony president and chief executive, speaks during the Sony Media Technology Centre launch at a film school on the outskirts of Mumbai, India, on March 4. Credit: Danish Siddiqui / Reuters

Sony partially blames online vigilante group Anonymous for data breach

Sony told U.S. lawmakers that the Internet vigilante group Anonymous indirectly allowed a network attack that exposed the personal data of millions of customers.

In a letter to the House Energy and Commerce Committee's panel on commerce, manufacturing and trade, Sony said that it discovered a file planted on one of its servers named "Anonymous" with the words "We are Legion," the tagline for the group that has brought down the websites of big corporations such as Visa, the letter said.

Sony's network may have been breached while it was defending itself against a denial-of-service attack from Anonymous, Sony said. The online activists were protesting a civil suit Sony brought in federal court in San Francisco against a hacker.

“Whether those who participated in the denial-of-service attacks were conspirators or whether they were simply duped into providing cover for a very clever thief, we may never know,” the letter said.

"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,” the letter said. Sony said the company earned of the first breach on April 19 and shut down the PlayStation Network the following day. The company informed account holders that their personal data was potentially exposed about a week later.

In response, Anonymous released a statement Wednesday denying the allegations, but did allow that individual members may have been involved.

"Sony is incompetent," the group said. "While it could be the case that other Anons have acted by themselves AnonOps was not related to this incident and takes no responsibility."

Also on Wednesday, U.S. Atty. Gen. Eric Holder told the Senate Judiciary Committee that the Justice Department had opened an investigation into "those hacking situations that have gotten publicity over the last few weeks, the Sony incident among them."

New York Atty. Gen. Eric Schneiderman on Wednesday subpoenaed three Sony divisions -- Sony Computer Entertainment, Sony Network Entertainment and Sony Online Entertainment -- for documents regarding their security, CNBC reported.

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Photo: A customer watches a monitor of Sony's PlayStation 3 at a Tokyo electrical shop April 27. Credit: Yoshikazu Tsuno / AFP / Reuters

U.S. attorney general launches probe into Sony data breach

The Justice Department has opened an investigation into the security breach at Sony Corp., in which two separate attacks over the last month shut down Sony's PlayStation Network and an online-gaming unit.

"We have open investigations with regard to those hacking situations that have gotten publicity over the last few weeks, the Sony incident among them," U.S. Atty. Gen. Eric H. Holder Jr. told the Senate Judiciary Committee Wednesday, according to Reuters.

Federal prosecutors in San Diego are working with FBI agents to look into the alleged hacking crimes, the news agency said.

Also Wednesday, Sony responded to a congressional committee inquiry into the network attacks.

The company "has been the victim of a very carefully planned, very professional, highly sophisticated criminal cyberattack designed to steal personal and credit card information for illegal purposes," Kaz Hirai, Sony's executive deputy president, wrote in the letter to the House Energy and Commerce Committee's panel on commerce, manufacturing and trade.

In the letter, Hirai said the company learned of the first breach on April 19 and shut down the PlayStation Network the following day. The company informed account holders that their personal data was potentially exposed about a week later.

"Throughout this challenging period, [employees] acted carefully and cautiously and strove to provide correct and accurate information while balancing concerns for our consumers' privacy and need for information," the letter said.

The attack on Sony's PlayStation Network and Qriocity music-streaming service compromised the personal information of 77 million customers accounts. On Sunday, the company suspended service for Sony Online Entertainment, best known for creating online multi-player games such as EverQuest and The Matrix Online, after an intrusion exposed personal data for about 24.6 million subscribers.

Sony apologized Saturday and announced several "welcome back" freebies for PlayStation customers, including 30 days of free access to Qriocity for affected customers as well as 30 days of access to the PlayStation Plus online game service. The company will also provide credit card protection services to relevant customers, Hirai said.

New York Atty. Gen. Eric Schneiderman on Wednesday subpoenaed three Sony divisions -- Sony Computer Entertainment, Sony Network Entertainment and Sony Online Entertainment -- for documents regarding their security, CNBC reported

Consumers have filed at least two lawsuits in California against Sony and are seeking federal class-action status.

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Photo: Shot of Sony's EverQuest 2, one of the games created by Sony Online Entertainment. Credit: Sony Online Entertainment