It looks as though the PlayStation Network is finally up and running at full capacity today, as Sony has announced via the PlayStation blog that the PlayStation Store is now available.
On Tuesday, Sony promised that the PSN would be fully restored by the end of the week. Yesterday, the PSN was down for a bit for the massive update that unveiled today. Users yesterday were unable to log in for several hours as Sony prepared for today’s big re-launch and the final piece of the “full restoration” puzzle that was promised by the end of May. Sony was pretty close to hitting their mark.
From the PS blog:
The PlayStation Store is back online and thank you everyone for your patience. You will notice a huge lineup of new downloadable games, demos, add-on content, themes, avatars and videos. Also, PlayStation Plus has been updated with new full game trials, free games and DLC, free avatars and even more discounts.
You may have noticed that the content promised as part of the Welcome Back offer is not yet live. It is currently in the final stages of testing and will be available to download soon; we’ll be sure to let you know when.
The “Welcome Back offer” is Sony’s apology to customers, an appreciation program that when live, will offer users free PS3 and PSP games, free movie rentals, trial memberships to PlayStation Plus and free virtual items available on PlayStation Home.
It has been an incredibly tough stretch for Sony in the past month and a half. With the restoration of the PlayStation Store, everything is now back up and running. After the initial shutdown that lasted multiple weeks, Sony first restored online multiplayer on May 16th.
While today is a pretty good day for Sony, having fully restored their embattled PlayStation Network, we’ll have to wait and see how hackers respond. Sony is still a popular target. The hacker group responsible for the weekend hack of the PBS website, LulzSec, has begun what they call #Sownage. They said yesterday that they were “making off with a bunch of [their] internal stuff.” They have also said that it is the “beginning of the end” for Sony.
Just a couple of hours ago, the group posted these two tweets:
@LulzSec
The Lulz BoatWe’re currently grouping together the things we’ve taken from @Sony and are arranging them in a way that everyone will easily understand.
5 hours ago via web · powered by @socialditto
@LulzSec
The Lulz BoatEverything we have will be published in multiple ways to ensure maximum embarrassment and exposure for @Sony and their security flaws. 😀 4 hours ago via web · powered by @socialditto
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