PSN Accounts [supposedly] hacked into and Sony's handling leaves something to be desired

Yesterday, Reddit user kadjar made a post saying that his PlayStation Network account was hacked. He was charged over $600 and Sony is only willing to refund $150 of that. He is unable to authorize his account on his own PlayStation 4 for another 6 months because it has just been deactivated, as per Sony policy.

[Jessahness]

Mainly so we can pay less for games. When in reality, it pretty must costs us the same damn thing.

[DarkOcelet]

Ps Plus and XBL Gold offerings should be better than Steam since people are paying 60$ each year for them.

[Death]

PS+ offers games to download and play as long as you are a subscriber. So far I have downloaded and played Injustice and Infamous First Light since subscribing again almost 6 months ago. I have no complaints and feel I received my moneys worth, but it doesn't quite feel like "thousands" of dollars worth of games. Realistically I could have gone to a Redbox and saved some money.

[Dgander]

How the hell are the games free when you pay a monthly subscription? Am I the only person on N4G that went to school?

[Nitrowolf2]

@Dgander

Everyopne knows that they are 'free' until the subscription is over, but you gotta look at the offerings and how much that all adds up. So far I've enjoyed hundreds of free games I was otherwise going to buy eventually. for $50 a year, it really isn't much.

I mean, this months we got valiant heart and oddworld, both games adding to about $40 alone. In a sense, yes we are paying for it, but it's offering makes up the cost, and how often do people actually play a game they beat to completion after several months?

[Gority]

@Dgander

Yes, you are the only one here who went to school. You are apparently also the only one here who has listened to Cage the Elephant's "Ain't no rest for the wicked" and Five Finger Death Punch's "Dot Your Eyes", because ya know, ain't nothing in this world for free.

[Eddie20101]

Another dishonest article from a no name site gets a ton of attention, obviously made up stories. Who would do online chat for this kind of problem. If anything, if the information was hacked, it was through Internet explorer or Google Chrome and the computer had spyware on it and the password was gotten when they logged into PSN on the computer. Stop going to porn sites and file sharing and you won't have those problems. Make sure that you have malware protection, and use a program like CCleaner after going to important password protected sites.

Anyway I doubt that Sony customer service would cut someone off without giving them other options like calling from a phone or having someone call them. I have always had good customer service from Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo the very few times I have ever had to call them over the years.

[Maxor]

Sony fanboys when PSN was free= Xbox Live is a rip off because you must pay for online!

Sony fanboys when you must pay to play online= Don't complain about "free" subscription only games!

It's hilarious because fanboys will always be fanboys. They're incapable of free thought and will defend their brand regardless of how valid the criticism.

[its_JEFF]

@Maxor how about the fact that Xbox fanboys keep insisting that XBL never gets hacked, No one on XBL has ever had their info stolen. They keep bringing up the PSN hack and how so much people's info were stolen, but we're there? And is there proof that it was from PSN and not some other service that's known for having its users info stolen all the time... like Origin? The fact is I heard more stories from XBL users getting info stolen than I've heard from PSN, but here's the big difference... XBL has never been down for a month so the perception is that PSN uaers info is in danger but the XBL users have nothing to worry about.

If you're gonna call out fanboys, you should really be calling all of them out. I honestly think both services are equally capable of giving up users info, but not chances are slim... I think where users info gets stolen is from services like Origin, FIFA, maybe even Ubisoft.

[logan_izer10]

Sounds like he just had a crappy password, end of story

[Neonridr]

did you see the responses from those chat agents though? I would be pissed if that's the kind of treatment I got.

[Dee_91]

Of course you would be pissed, you lost access to your account, but it aint their job to console you for a mistake you more than likely made lol.

[Nykamari]

Or he gave it out, game sharing with a random on the net. Well that's money lost.
@ cobra you beat me

[admiralvic]

Regardless of where their fault might be, I certainly don't blame them for getting angry at such a response. I know I had a similar run in recently with Walmart and was just as pissed.

I had someone steal my gift card by doing something* and I informed CS about it. They told me to talk to the manager at a local store, so I did and she told me I can move on or file a police report. Didn't even feign interest in my problem and basically brushed me aside.

I mean, I can understand screwing up or being in the wrong, but thats no excuse for basically brushing me/them off and doing nothing. The least they could have done is feign some compassion by saying something like "we're sorry that happened, but there is nothing we can do."

* I still have the physical card, never used the card and was told the card was scanned meaning it was not bought online. I won't speculate how they did it, just that it was certainly something that the average person is going to prepare for.

[baryonyx]

I didn't know it was Walmart's job to take care of you're Giftcard, or that if someone steals it from you, that it's their problem. ofc they gonna brush you off, cause it's not their problem, it's you'rs. If someone steals you're bike in a supermarked underground's garage, can you go to the security on that mall, and get a new bike back? no, you will file a suit with the police, the police will check the cameras to identify the criminal. If someone fucked up with their PSN information, how is it sony's fault? I delete my credit card information EVERYTIME i use it, as well as on other sites as well. Sharing accounts, doing dumb shit online or on Web, is all on you as a consumer. If Sony themselves was hacked, and the information was stolen from there, then it's sony's problem

[blackblades]

Or he have gave it out, remember the kid that handed the controller to a stranger and deleted his characters on destiny. It's his fought if he didn't do it it would of never happen.

[PickAShoe]

password123

[ctate1995]

"password" is strong enough? My accounts compromised then.....

[22CobraKing]

Maybe he gameshared with a person and the other person might of given it to someone else to download something but messed with his account.

[Jessahness]

Kind of like that kid who gameshared Destiny and lost everything
*edit I meant shareplay. nbd.

[kayoss]

gameshared and share play are two different things.

[FPSRUSSIA]

exactly what i was going to say he might of game shared with someone

[plmkoh]

TL;DR Man gets phished, man demands compensation.

[kayoss]

How do we know if he was actually hacked or he gave his account info to someone and that person abused it? Its like me and netflix. I never use netflix, but I shared my netflix with my cousin and wife. He watches some weird stuff on there. My wife would see the history and thinks it was me. I cant prove that it wasnt me unless my cousin confesses.
In this case, how can you prove that he was hacked unless that hacker comes out and say he did it.

[plmkoh]

And how do you prove the network was 'hacked'? Because one isolated person claims his info got compromised, therefore everyone else is affected?

You can bet good money he either got phished or he used the same details as some other website login.

[kayoss]

LMAO. I do wear the pants in house. But when i looked at the list of movies that my cousin watches. I also question him. Lets put it this way, all the movies he watches involves lots of sex.

[rainslacker]

Sony has records to track what is brought where and I'm sure they could prove if transactions were valid or not. Stories like this rarely give all the information needed to make a determination on if the CS person did the right thing according to policy. The attitude of the CS people could be discussed, but even then, without being there from start to finish, it's just people making assumptions.

Since it's not a problem among hundreds or thousands of users, the chances that Sony was hacked to get the info is slim to none...that's just not how hackers work. The most likely scenario is the guy gave his information out...possibly without realizing it(phishing), or he was game sharing and gave his account info out to someone who decided to rack up a huge bill, or even that he just charged a crap ton of money then decided he didn't want to pay it for some reason(also pretty common).

To be fair, I'd err on the side of any merchant here, because I know how crappy people can be to CS people first hand, and I know 99% of the time, they always lie. The people with legitimate concerns don't act like twats, and they rarely go venting to the net, they go up the food chain to get the next person of the CS chain....which the liars sometimes do as well but do it in such a way to try and get others to think that the CS person did something wrong, and that they were all peaches and cream.

[Aloy-Boyfriend]

Anyone can say his PSN account was hacked. You have to prove that you were actually hacked and not that you gave you account to someone else and made Purchases with it.

My account has never been hacked, and I don't even worry about. I keep changing my password every 3 months, and i Don't give my account to anyone. People should be more careful about his personal info

Also, when someone access your account from another console, your billing info always deletes itself. It's little to impossible that someone would use your credit card to make purchase, let alone spend $600. It seems to me this guy was tricked and want money in return. You have only yourself to blame

[JeffGUNZ]

eh, depends. A few years back this happened to me on my 360. What happened was my yahoo address linked with live got hacked and they were able to get into my account and buy MS points and what not. My bank refunded the money immediately and xbox did an investigation. They caught the person per the follow up call and I was kept off my account during the 5-7 investigation. Sucks when it happens.

[Taero]

Not disagreeing with you over the first two paragraphs but couldn't someone have accessed the PSN through the web store front and bought things on there without triggering the deletion?

[rainslacker]

The web store front requires you put in the CC CVV code, and put in your password on checkout. On the console itself you can opt out of password verification at checkout(unless it's changed in the past 4 years).

Anyhow, it's easy to catch people who phished a password and used the console to make a purchase, whether this actually comes to criminal charges I don't know. Making the purchase on a PC would not transfer it to a PS3/4 with a different account AFAIK, and as soon as a person logged on to a PS3/4 with the proper account, they would be logged and be found.

[il-JumperMT]

Phishing scams are not hacks and if you fall for them you are not entitled to anything. Its your own fault deal with it.

[ltachiUchiha]

Gamers that play online on psn or xbl should be smarter. There is a reason they sell psn & xbl cards. If u put your credit card online to purchase stuff & your card gets hacked. Thats your fault. U know damn well these services been breached before yet u still decide to use your own card? Use your head ppl. If hackers can hack the government what makes u think psn and xbl is unhackable? Smdh.

[SaveFerris]

I agree. I'm sure it is a horrible thing to have your account hacked but you can definitely minimise the damage by using prepaid cards instead of linking a credit card to it. I don't know why someone would take the risk if prepaid cards are an option.

[rainslacker]

Retail stores get hacked too. Last year Target and Home Depot had huge breaches, so even just using your card anywhere puts it at risk.

Anyhow, pre-paid cards are great alternatives, or banks offer a card for online use which requires tranfers to the card, and can have limits. I use this, and i get a text message every time I use that card for anything.

Anyhow, it's worth taking precautions, but at the same time, you limit convienance by worrying about it too much. There is customer protection with credit cards, so best to take advantage of it when needed.

On a side note, when you use those Visa check cards as a debit purchase, that purchase is not protected under CC unauthorized purchase protection, and most banks will charge you their standard check reversal fee to dispute the charge.

[Gh05t]

He didnt send the person 600 in a scam... Hacking is defined as an unauthorized access... so even if they found out his password through social engineering the second they log in he is by definition being hacked.

let me just float another issue out here. If a bank robber robs a bank and i sell him a cheesburger and the cops learn that the bills i have are serielized with the same numbers as the ones that were stolen they will take that money back... you cant keep any items that are considered stolen. Most the time its the bank that fronts the money though. Fraud departments are huge at banks for a reason. Lots of people taking what isnt thiers.

Sony sold goods that was purchased with stolen monies... simple as that.

When my account was hacked on XBL you bet i called my bank and reported fraud... I dont care which person ends up taking the brunt of it but that will just motivate the companies to try and find the hacker to get thier damages covered.

You can not legally buy or sell stolen goods including transfering money for goods if the money are stolen.

[KwietStorm]

So one person has his account info compromised, which could be for a multitude of reasons, and they come to the conclusion that PSN accounts, plural, are being hacked, and Sony doesn't care. That's some next gen 120fps sleuthing right thurr.

[BLow]

Man, if I could hit agree 20 more times that would be great....haha. I really don't like some gamers now days. Did this deserve an article? Wake me up when this is a widespread issue.

[Muzikguy]

So much LOL. Nice comment, +1 and very true. Journalism is amazing today.

I hadn't read anything about this just seen some headlines. Many sites are freaking out towards Sony like they're being a bunch of rude people that don't care. Obviously that's not the case. I know some (actually many) CS people are terrible, but Sony is a very big company and wouldn't want to be frowned upon in that way. If I had been breached somehow I'd not rest until my problem was solved. That's assuming of course that it wasn't my fault in the first place.

[PiNkFaIrYbOi]

Cry me a river. It is his own fault for having a credit/debit card linked with his account.

Anyone with a brain knows not to do that and stuff.

[Hoffmann]

This is the only really good comment with sense here so far.

Thank you.

[dcj0524]

EXACTLY, I always delete my info when I'm done

[Lon3wolf]

I add funds to the wallet from paypal that works too to stop having info stored.

[wodan]

Title says PSN accounts are getting hacked yet the article talk about one person, Sony doesn't care yet they gave him refund seems like some one is desperate for hits.

[Jessahness]

Hi. They only offered a 150 dollar refund and still won't allow him access to his account. And um.. I talked about other people who had the same problem. Thanks :)

[BLow]

People as in how many? Out of 10s of MILLIONS of other accounts out there, you talked about other people. What? 2 or 3 people? 10? Give me a break.

[ginsunuva]

How does Sony know if it was a legitimate phishing attack?

I could tell my friend to log into my account, spend $500, then tell Sony someone used my account and get $500 back.

[MrBeatdown]

He says... "I'm locked out of logging into my own account on my PS4 for six months."

The funny thing is he also said this...

"I then turned on my PS4, logged in with my new credentials, and attempted to activate my PS4 with my account, but it informed me that I could not activate it as long as there was another PS4 bound to my account."

He sounds like a smart guy.

[magiciandude]

This chat makes Sony look much less like the corporation everyone thought that "cares about the gamer." Looking at the responses of the support chat, I am glad I don't subscribe to PS+ anymore.

[Spotie]

Yeah, sure. Because someone who so frequently trolls Sony articles actually gives a damn about the veracity of this report, right?

This makes Sony look like they have a person or two who isn't very good at customer service, and guess what? They're not alone. I challenge you to find ANY support center that hasn't had at least one loser on the payroll for some period of time.

But yes, let's take this one isolated incident as an example of a pervading attitude at Sony that contradicts the overall image they've garnered. That makes a whole lot of sense.

It DOES make sense to base your opinion on one instance, despite hundreds of thousands , even millions of contradicting situations... right?

[magiciandude]

Sony closed down studios behind popular franchises. Certainly they care about the gamers, right?

Sony requires PS+ for online gaming on PS4, and in return offering mostly indies that few people would bother playing for more than 3 minutes. Certainly they care about the gamers, right?

Sony promised a free version of Driveclub and it's still not here. Certainly they care about the gamers, right?

Yoshida has openly admitted to investing in fewer AAA titles for the PS4. Certainly they care about the gamers, right?

Sony chopped virtually all first party AAA support for the Vita, and still overcharges for the memory cards. Certainly they care about the gamers, right?

There's more, but these are the issues that really bother me which caused me to stop believing in Sony this generation, and this is coming from a strong PS3 fan last gen (still a huge PS3 fan today, mind you).

As far as customer service goes, they could have been better. I've read experiences of PSN users getting banned because they admitted over the phone with Sony's CS to providing a false date of birth on the PSN account registration and having lost all the money's worth of content purchased with that account as a byproduct. If I personally had any of these experiences, I would've ceased to buy Sony anything from that point on regardless if it's really Sony's problem or mine.

[kenshiro100]

What does your rant have to do with the article?

Seriously, take a back seat aand sit down.

[kevinsheeks]

Did you guys miss over those very unprofessional chat logs? And I'm pretty sure all of these aren't cases of being phised. Psn accounts are being cracked not hacked and either sold or given away for free on various forums.

But this is interesting to see some put their heads in the sand and ignore it maybe when it happens to your account others will do the same.

it's pretty scary when your first instinct to an article is to rush in and defend no matter what without even reading.

This has to be th . . unfortunately, it appears I am not able to assist you with your request today. I will be disconnecting this chat session. Thanks for contacting playstation.

[spacedelete]

what a stupid troll site. where exactly does it say Sony is even giving him $150 ? it doesn't say that anywhere.

[mnitroy]

It says it in the reddit post the author of the article posted, straight from the primary source! :)

[hasamalaha]

Clearly there's a click-bait title here, but the chat support was pretty bad. You just need to pick up the phone when chat support gets you no where.

[Rimeskeem]

Accounts get hacked all the time on all kinds of services.

I feel no pity for people stupid enough to give their credit card to someone else and expect it to be fine unless they know the person personally and could go to their house and beat the crap out of them.

[MegaRay]

Dude, you have trust issue. I for one will give any one who need.

BTW, how to post an article in n4g... just incase '-.-

[theFAYEsorceress]

i'm 100% sure that someone's account is getting hacked every day across every platform lolz it comes down to who decides to share their experience or not. it's like assuming that every restaurant has a perfect track record for quality and service just because you don't hear about every single complaint. some people on here are so f***king stupid, i swear lolz

[Hakoom]

there is a very easy way to jack psn accounts.. this user was jacked not hacked..
and sony isnt willing to solve this although i even suggested to them to put a 2 step vertification with a mobile phone... but they wont listen..

[Jdoki]

2 factor authentication would be sensible

I use it on my Blizzard and Google accounts. I know it's not infallible, but it is certainly better than what we currently have... And Sony's track record is not exactly great in this regard!!

[BattleTorn]

I had my online pass for Resistance 3 not work.
I called Sony and they said it'd been used. When I told them that 12character codes arent as secure as 25 - the support rep laughed and said "I'll be sure to pass that onto the CEO, next time I see him"

The GameSpot manager, who in the end had to replace my code, couldn't believe my story.

[Bytor]

Don't give them any ideas I spent 2 hours and a reset on the three times they allow you to install a game on your PC trying to get plants Vs Zombies to work.

[Jdoki]

In my experience Sony's PlayStation customer support is poor.

I had a lot of problems with my PS3 activations and the support was useless. Their advice was along the lines of 'tough luck, buy a PS3 Slim'.

It is unfortunate that in these cases it appears to have not got any better.

I understand that it must be difficult if support suspects some idiot has shared his password. But it seems that Sony take the position of guilty until proven innocent.

If I were in this situation I would contact my bank or credit card provider and have the charges reimbursed.

It may be frustrating not having access to the PS4, but I'd rather get the money back and let the bank CC provider sort out the details.

[KingPin]

so two guys claims their account is hacked with the only proof being "i didnt do it someone else did" and the headline makes it sound like mass hacking spree.

gaming journalism...making retarded headlines since 1999.

[IGiveHugs2NakedWomen]

This article is nonsense. I have 150 dollars sitting in my PSN account and it hasn't disappeared. I did notice that I was unable to log into my account quickly a few months ago probably because some [email protected]** trying to use a brute force hack on my account. Fortunately, I use extremely complex passwords that use capital letters, small letters, keyboard symbols and numbers so it would take a few thousand years for a computer hack to break it. If you choose to allow someone else to have access to your account, be prepared for what comes next... If you use a weak password, be prepared for what comes next...

12345abcde is not a secure password...
IAMGOD is not a secure password...
Your birthday is not a secure password...
Your name is not a secure password...

If you have a password that doesn't look like this:

S0nY(2)C0mPuTer(3)EnTerTainMe nt(4)

or

z9a1y8b2x7c3&100%

You have an extremely weak password and you need to change it even if you don't have financial or personal information linked to your account. If someone gets into your account, they can deactivate your console and activate another console in your name.

I've said it once and i'll say it again...

Stop sharing your account or you'll be completely responsible for whatever happens after... PERIOD.

Do yourselves a favor and test your password
https://howsecureismypasswo...
If the results are less than billions of years, your password is weak.

[baryonyx]

Do you remember the password, saves it on you're PC or got notes in you're office? It doesn't matter how secure password someone got, saving their password on their pc's are the dumbest shit anyone can do, and always keep the Web cam unplugged. It's not only the password, It's fire-walls, different security measures on you're PC as well. It even helps cleaning the PC everyday after a extended use, or if you have downloaded something, spy-wares are at it's weakest when it first gets into you're pc, after a certain unknown amount of time, that motherfucker can have spread itself into the vital part of the software. Online security is no jokes anymore. I've saved my Password and general information on a Memory stick, which is the best way, so it's easily obtainable, and since it's so close to you're pc, easy to use with the copy/paste

[Taero]

Hah, tried that and got 50 quattuordecillion years.

[paracardium]

No proof here..useless post except for the guy above don't give out your passwords for any reason.