A report from Reuters' Tokyo branch reveals that the data lifted from PlayStation Network over two weeks ago had made its way from your life to Sony's servers into hacker's hands and finally, from there, onto an unnamed website. "Sony said on Saturday it had removed from the Internet the names and partial addresses of 2,500 sweepstakes contestants that had been stolen by hackers and posted on a website," Reuters reports.

Before you fret, let's detail the data a bit: It was from customers who entered a 2001 sweepstakes (Win a Free Identity Theft!) and did not include sensitive bits like credit card numbers, social security numbers, or passwords. "The website was out of date and inactive when discovered as part of the continued attacks on Sony," the beleaguered electronics company said. It's unclear how Sony was able to remove the website as quickly as it evidently did. Late last night, Sony re-adjusted its timeline for reactivating PSN, originally expected to be back online in some form this week, citing the need for further testing.

http://www.joystiq.com/2011/05/07/stolen-psn-data-published-to-web-sony-removes-2500-names-and-p/#comments

Posted: May 07, 2011 10:08 am