Taipei play hard ball with Sony over PSN hack, threaten with fines

Taipei are demanding that Sony provide details about the leak of the Playstation Network user data, sending the electronics giant a letter asking it to explain the incident ‘from start to finish'.

Sony have been under some public scrutiny and have faced the biggest backlash of their history after keeping quiet about an intrusion which threatens the privacy of millions of people. The Taiwan capital's Law and Regulation Commission said late yesterday that they were demanding answers from Sony.

The letter was sent on Wednesday and gives Sony 10 days to respond. If they fail to respond on time they could be fined a substantial amount of money, up to NT$300,000 for breaching local consumer protection laws.

“Manufacturers and service providers should take responsibility for their customers' reasonable expectations of security, including personal information security, This incident may involve leaks of consumer names, e-mails, birth dates and even credit card information.” the statement read. Commission Chairman Yeh Ching Yuan said that they are worried about a theft of credit card numbers which could damage consumer credit lines and affect credit records.

Personal information of 77 million people connected with the Playstation Network may have been compromised and the network is still down as Sony try and deal with security issues. Sony have faced negative feedback on their handling of the incident, with many people feeling they took far too long to release the information.

KitGuru says: This is the worst incident in history of a computer theft hack, and Sony will have a hard time recovering with the public.

Become a Patron!