One week ago, Sony executives announced at the company's big mea culpa press conference that service to the embattled PlayStation Network would be restored in short order. In fact, Sony seemed confident in its ability to increase the security of it its online gaming platform to ensure that future attacks would be prevented from compromising user data, be it personal information, credit card numbers, or anything else.
"We have a clear path to have PlayStation Network and Qriocity systems back online, and expect to restore some services within a week," said Patrick Seybold, Sony senior director of corporate communications and social media, in an update posted to the PlayStation Blog on April 26. "We're working day and night to ensure it is done as quickly as possible. We appreciate your patience and feedback."
Well, it's been a week: The PlayStation Network is still down.
To the company's credit, representatives have been hedging their PlayStation Network update announcements with the suggestion that it might take longer than announced or predicted for the company to bring the service online again. And that's exactly the situation eagers gamers will find themselves in today: A new blog post from Sony's Seybold indicates that Sony isn't quite ready to flip the switch on the updated PlayStation Network just yet.
"When we held the press conference in Japan last week, based on what we knew, we expected to have the services online within a week," said Seybold in yesterday's blog post. "We were unaware of the extent of the attack on Sony Online Entertainment servers, and we are taking this opportunity to conduct further testing of the incredibly complex system."
So what's the timeframe? That's the catch: There isn't one. Sony has stopped making any mention of an expected date of delivery for the restoration of the PlayStation Network. Antsy gamers are just going to have to wait it out—and keep checking Sony's official PlayStation blog for more daily information.
Once the PlayStation Network fires back up again, those that haven't jumped ship will find themselves treated to the company's "Welcome Back" package… in addition to a $1 million identity theft insurance policy that the company recently took out for all U.S. PlayStation Network members.
"This will include, among other benefits, a month of free PlayStation Plus membership for all PSN customers, as well as an extension of subscriptions for PlayStation Plus and Music Unlimited customers to make up for time lost," said Howard Stringer, Sony chairman and chief executive, in a May 5 blog post.
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