It seemed like Sony’s delayed NEX-C3 micro-four-third camera is indeed coming, though they’re still keeping quiet about its launch date. but the camera’s instruction manual has now made a brief appearance on the company’s Czech Republic site, offering yet more evidence that the successor to the NEX-3 is set for an imminent launch. The camera mock-up on the description page appears to be identical to previously leaked photos, and judging by control layout, NEX-3 and NEX-5 users should find it fairly familiar. Of course, the manual has been taken down, but as the Internet goes, nothing sleeps away untouched. DPReview points out that the camera is smaller than both previous models, and includes a 16 megapixel sensor, a new 30mm f/3.5 macro lens priced at €259 (about $383).

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Sony’s PSN network and Qriocity was breached by external intruders two weeks ago before Easter weekend, and rage was felt all over the PlayStation community. Sony’s SOE portal was also breached few days ago. The company has announced that it plans to restore PSN and Qriocity services back in two weeks’ time, and is detailing its gift to the loyal users that endured the outage period.

In a press release posted to the PlayStation blog in the early hours of Sunday morning, Sony revealed that it plans to phase in operation of PSN and Qriocity on a regional basis. The initial phase of the rollout will include the following services:

• Restoration of Online game-play across PS3 and PSP systems
• This includes titles requiring online verification and downloaded games
• Access to Music Unlimited powered by Qriocity for PS3/PSP for existing subscribers
• Access to account management and password reset
• Access to download un-expired Movie Rentals on PS3, PSP and MediaGo
• PlayStation Home
• Friends List
• Chat Functionality

Once PSN services are restored, users attempting to log in will be forced to change their password before they can carry on. It is important to note that your PSN account password can only be changed on the same PS3 in which that account was activated, or through validated email confirmation.

Sony says the investigation into what happened and the people behind the attacks is ongoing. However, Kazuo Hirai, Executive Deputy President at Sony, spoke at the weekend about the breach and how it had affected the industry as a whole. Not much was said about the breach though, as if Sony did not know the severity of the damage caused, or is being tight lip.

“This criminal act against our network had a significant impact not only on our consumers, but our entire industry. These illegal attacks obviously highlight the widespread problem with cyber-security,” he said. “We take the security of our consumers’ information very seriously and are committed to helping our consumers protect their personal data. In addition, the organization has worked around the clock to bring these services back online, and is doing so only after we had verified increased levels of security across our networks.”

However, good news is that there are some ‘freebies’ for existing PSN users that Sony called the ‘Welcome Back Appreciation Program’ for its users. The thank you package will include a ’30-days free’ of PSN Plus for every user, selected PlayStation entertainment content for free download (content will differ depending on your region), and 30-days free of Music Unlimited for Qriocity users. Sony says users can also expect additional “Welcome Back” entertainment and service offerings over the coming weeks.

In related news, Sony’s Patrick Seybold denied reports that the company was given the opportunity to purchase a list of credit card numbers allegedly stolen by hackers.

“One report indicated that a group tried to sell millions of credit card numbers back to Sony,” said Seybold. “To my knowledge there is no truth to this report of a list, or that Sony was offered an opportunity to purchase the list.”

Seybold also clarified that while the passwords were not encrypted, the company did employ the use of hashing and the passwords were not stored in cleartext. Now that’s very comforting.

SOURCE via Sony

Famous for hacking Sony’s PlayStation 3 for such a long time and finally succeeded, and was brought into court by Sony, George Hotz expressed that he’s glad he doesn’t have a PSN account, something that he’s thankful about given the last couple of weeks.

Former Sony legal target George Hotz, who managed to crack Sony’s PlayStation 3 firmware, posted on his blog his views on the recent hacking event of Sony’s PSN and SOE crisis. He’s also quick to mention that he had nothing to do with the hacking of PSN. Even with his view that Sony is a “douche,” he does not condone the type of malicious hacking that can negatively affect others.

“And to anyone who thinks I was involved in any way with this, I’m not crazy, and would prefer to not have the FBI knocking on my door. Running homebrew and exploring security on your devices is cool, hacking into someone elses server and stealing databases of user info is not cool,” Hotz wrote. “You make the hacking community look bad, even if it is aimed at douches like Sony.”

“Also, let’s not fault the Sony engineers for this, the same way I do not fault the engineers who designed the BMG rootkit,” he continued. “The fault lies with the executives who declared a war on hackers, laughed at the idea of people penetrating the fortress that once was Sony, whined incessantly about piracy, and kept hiring more lawyers when they really needed to hire good security experts. Alienating the hacker community is not a good idea.”

Then again, I wonder how he gets his PlayStation 3 to update its firmware.

Looks like things aren’t going well at all for Sony as things keep getting shittier for the Japanese console giant. After their PSN was attacked two weeks ago, now Sony Online Entertainment (SOE) has also fall victim to yet another breach. According to Wall Street Journal, Sony has confirmed that the latest attack has already taken access of personal information for a staggering 24.6 million accounts, and they include names, addresses, telephone numbers, email addresses, gender, Date of birth, login ID, and hashed passwords. Woot! Regardless, SOE’s online services were taken offline earlier today.

SOURCE via Wall Street Journal

As Valve’s Portal 2 was just launched, many gamers were looking forward to this long weekend of Labor’s Day and try out Portal 2’s online co-op mode using Sony’s PSN, but were disappointed to wake up to yet another day of “server is currently down for maintenance” message.

The PlayStation blog is filled with reader comments like, “E[a]ster weekend is goin to suck completely,” and “I was really looking forward to playing some Portal 2 co-op, but I guess I’ll just finish up the single player campaign,” and “This is what happens when you like Steam and the Playstation Network together. Pretty obvious who’s behind this – GLaDOS.”

Sony’s PSN breach issue is causing a big ruckus all over the world. US, Canada, and England is already asking an open inquiry into the ongoing PlayStation Network outage and data leak, which could potentially lead to the theft of up to 77 million PSN users’ personal information.

Speculation is running rampant that hacker group Anonymous is actually continuing its attacks, but according to VGN365 Anonymous is not responsible for the PSN downtime everyone is currently experiencing.

Reuters reports that Sony has contacted the San Diego office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s cybercrimes unit to look into the data breach. The news service could not get public comment, but did cite unnamed sources as saying say the law enforcement body was investigating the matter.

The attack on PSN is not going to be easy to deluge away for Sony, as not only governments around the world are seeking inquiries, but even more hurdles are on the way. Earlier today, the first lawsuit over the matter was filed, with an Alabama man seeking class-action status on behalf of all PlayStation users whose accounts may have been compromised.

Due to the beef with Sony, Anonymous member Kato stated that the hacking group is currently preparing another attack against Sony, and it’ll be scheduled to happen when the PlayStation Network is back online. If Sony gets PSN running only to have it break down again right away from an Anonymous attack, consumer backlash could be huge.

SOURCE via Reuters

Sony’s PSN outage is in its second week as of today since 19 April, but good news is coming from PlayStation Blog rep Patrick Seybold, as he’s just posted an update on the current situation. We’ve already known that our personal information has been taken, but many users are still very concern over another important issue: “When will it god damn get back online? I want my Portal 2 co-op!” Hopefully I get it right.

Yes, good news indeed, as Mr Seybold said that Sony expects to have “some services” up and running within a week from yesterday. He also mentioned that important personal information like credit card numbers database was encrypted and there is no evidence anything was taken, but that’s a possibility that still cannot be ruled out completely, as Sony is still not able to comprehend the damage that has been dealt.

Also, Gamasutra reports game developers are getting new SDKs with updated security features as well. When the service comes back up, expect a mandatory system update that requires a new password before getting back to your Mortal Kombat or Portal 2-related plans for the weekend.

[PlayStation Blog via Gamasutra]

If you’ve not known, Sony’s online portal the PSN for the PlayStation 3, where players get to connect online and play multiplayer with everyone else, has been down on April 19^th. At first, Sony did not comment on the issue, but later on stated that the PSN outage was caused by “malicious actions”.

Yes, the PSN was attacked by hackers, and thus far we’ve received unconfirmed news that this might be caused by a group called ‘Anonymous’, which backs Wikileak and Julian. Of course, this is just speculations.

Sony UK has mentioned that all information of PSN and Qriocity users have been obtained, including your credit card number (excluding security code) and expiration date, but they still can’t confirm the state of the breach, and that they are working with outside experts to “understand the scope of the breach” before posting the full lowdown earlier today. For those interested, Sony has a lengthy FAQ page regarding this incident.

Sony’s failure to report the status of the breach has caused Connecticut Senator Blumenthal very angry about the situation, “demanding answers” from SCEA president Jack Tretton.

Here’s what Sony UK indicates was exposed:

• Name
• Shipping address
• Billing address
• Country
• E-mail address
• Birthdate
• PSN/Qriocity ID
• PSN/Qriocity password
• PSN/Qriocity security question and answer
• Purchase history

SOURCE via PlayStation Blog

So the weird shaped Sony Honeycomb tablet is indeed real, but the real thing doesn’t look so weird after all. Concept designs are always exaggerated, meh. Right, enough ranting from me, let’s talk about the tablet. Sony hosted a press event in Tokyo yesterday where the company announced a pair of Android 3.0 tablets. Yes, there’re two Honeycomb slates.

The first is the 9.4-inch S1 media tablet (aka, Qriocity focused) with a curved top much like a folded magazine and both front- and rear-facing cameras. The S1 features a Tegra 2 SoC and customized “Quick and Smooth” touch panel UI with “Swift” web browser. It can also be used as a remote control for Sony gear thanks to integrated infrared, which sounds so yesteryear.

The second tablet is the dual-screen S2 clamshell with its pair of 5.5-inch 1,024 x 480 pixel displays, Tegra 2 SoC, and camera. While it sounds bulky, Kunimasa Suzuki just pulled the hinged tablet from his jacket pocket on stage, which makes it like a pocketable-tablet. Cool right, reminds me of Nokia’s first communicator. Sony takes advantage of the two screens with a custom book-style UI layout for its e-reader app, email (keyboard on one display with your messages on the other), and others.

Both the S1 and S2 tablets are PlayStation Certified and are WiFi and 3G/4G “compatible” according to Sony. Of course, the codenames will change in time to a more ‘marketable’ name, and is expected to come in fall.

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When Sony discontinued the NEX-3, we can guess why. But the only reason we though we knew, are to avoid clashing with the NEX-5’s sales as the NEX-3 is stuck in between. However, now we had another reason to refer to. Apparently Sony is hard at work on developing the next NEX-3.

The successor will probably be called the NEX-C3, and is rumoured to include the same 16.2 megapixel image sensor used in the Sony Alpha A55 DSLR, as well as HD video capture (as expected) and the new flash seen in the image above. Leaked photos on Sony Alpha Rumors reveal an LCD with the same tilt capability we love on the NEX-3, as well as minor adjustments to the controls. The blog also got its hands on some leaked images of the Sony Alpha A35 DSLR (pictured below), though there’s no details about it yet.

Apparently Sony is said to have both cameras launched this month, but was set back by the catastrophic earthquake and tsunami that hit Japan in March. No pricing has been rumoured yet, but we expect the NEX-C3 to be priced similarly with the now-discontinued NEX-3.

SOURCE via Sony Alpha Rumor
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Take the tiny little Xperia X8 with Éclair; add some new funky colors, the traditional Walkman logo that embraced a fleet of Sony Ericsson with music-focused features, and well you’re now looking at the very first Walkman phone running Android. Ladies and gentlemen, meet the W8. As expected, the W8 will have a low-end spec similar to the one that it wants to imitate. A 3-inch, 320 x 480 touchscreen, a 600MHz processor, 168MB of RAM and Android 2.1. It’s not listed in the US site, yet, but it’s already up in the Germany’s page.

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