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On like Donkey Kong: Mass. woman sues Sony over PlayStation hacking

An Essex County resident yesterday filed a class-action lawsuit against Sony over the theft of some 100 million PlayStation Network user records - and the loss of access to the gaming network.

In her lawsuit, filed yesterday in US District Court in Boston, Dawn Thompson says she is seeking in excess of $5 million - plus lawyers' fees - for herself and fellow gamers. Thompson charges the company negligently disregarded basic security measures, lied to subscribers and is depriving customers of access to the network that they paid for.

Sony shut PSN last month after discovering it had been hacked. Thompson, who says she bought a PlayStation 3 and PSN access in 2009, charges:

Plaintiff is informed and believes that Defendants have been aware for a substantial period of time that PSN was prone to catastrophic loss of data from a security breach. Nevertheless, Defendants failed to warn its customers of the problem or tried to prevent them from suffering system suspension from security breaches and data losses. Defendants have failed to effectively remedy the problems and defects inherent in the PSN. Unwilling to admit fault, SONY sat silently while consumers purchased defective PlayStation consoles and PSN service without warning customers about the risks inherent in purchasing and relying upon SONY’s data security.

The suit alleges:

SONY was, at all times relevant herein, in violation of the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard by, including (without limitation), the following conduct: improperly storing and retaining credit card transaction and customer data in an unencrypted, unsecured, and unauthorized manner, failing to all reasonable steps to destroy, or arrange for the destruction of a customer’s addresses to and from its computer systems; or properly perform dynamic packet filtering; failing to properly restrict access to its computers; failing to properly protect stored data; failing to encrypt cardholder data and other sensitive information; failing to properly implement and update adequate anti-virus and anti-spyware software that would properly prevent unauthorized data transmissions caused by viruses, executables or scripts, from its servers or computer systems; failing to track and monitor all access to network resources and cardholder data; failing to regularly test security systems and processes or maintain an adequate policy that addresses information security, or to run vulnerability scans.

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Comments

If her argument is that she paid for PSN access and should be compensated, this suit will be short lived.
Unlike XBox, where you have to buy a monthly/yearly subscription to access the online functionality, Playstion Network access is free to anyone that owns a PS3 and has an internet connection.

PSN is a feature of a product, not a product in and of itself.

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There are many games out there that require PSN access to play them because so much of the content is tied to your ability to multi-player online (think Call of Duty and other first-person shooters). Sure, they might have solo missions too, but the game is marketed explicitly for its team vs. team action which is completely dead in the absence of PSN.

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Yes COD and other first person shooter are tied up in the online portion of it but it is not the only thing the game was intended to do! It's like MK9 yes its multi-player online game play but there is solo player also most of the trophies you achieve are not just in online they are in the single player also! therefore no there is no way she is paying for PSN! she is paying for her internet service which she can still use on any other computer or Capable Television! She will never win this suit against Sony!

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Sony also has a Paid service called PSN-PLUS, but it's not really a service per say. It's access to free content and discounted content, while MP connectivity is still considered standard and free.

The big issue is the prosecution needs to prove their claims, and it's going to very hard since they really have no access to the server's and tings that went wrong.

So far from the answers to the congressional inquiry, there's nothing we can "sue" for. This is just some smuck trying to get a handout.

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This suit is over the leaking of millions of peoples personal information, names, addresses, and credit card information.

Also the cost of PSN is bundled with the upfront price of the PS3, the most expensive of the 3 current consoles

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But there is a section in there about being deprived of access to PSN.

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So? Sony can be sued for false advertising.

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