With Sony coming under fire by Congress on the security breach of the PSN for past week, they have finally given an official response in a hearing in Washington, DC on "The Threat of Data Theft to American Consumers". Kazuo Hirai, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Sony Computer Entertainment America, submitted written answer that you can find here.
Essentially, Sony says that they only alerted consumers about the security breach only after was "verified". They admit that they are the victim of a "carefully planned, very professional, highly sophisticated criminal cyber attack" with one specifically planted file on the SOE servers named "Anonymous" with the words "We are Legion". So perhaps Anonymous is truly at fault for this…
Though forensic teams "could not rule out whether credit card information had been accessed", "the major credit card companies have not reported any fraudulent transactions that they believe are the direct result of this cyber attack".
In the near future, Sony will provide complimentary identity theft protection to U.S. account holders as well as a "Welcome Back" program that includes free downloads, 30 days of free PlayStation Plus as well as additional days equal to the number of days of interruption for PlayStation Plus and Music Unlimited.
Meanwhile, we are playing Xbox Live waiting for PSN.
