The saga of Sony hacks continues, this time targeting the company’s mobile phone unit.
Sony Ericsson has confirmed that its Canadian digital download platform, the “eShop,” has been compromised. 2,000 users are affected, according to statements from a company spokesperson speaking to the AFP.
“Their personal information was posted on a website called ‘The Hacker News’. The information includes registered names, email addresses and encrypted passwords. But it does not include credit card information,” Sony Ericsson said.
This is just the latest in a string of highly focused attacks that have targeted virtually every segment of Sony’s business. It started when hackers infiltrated the company’s Playstation Network servers, accessing data from tens of millions of PS3 and PSP owners and causing Sony to shut down the service for nearly a month. Some Playstation services still remain offline following the April attack.
Since then, it’s been nothing but bad news for Sony. The company later found out the Playstation attack also impacted Sony’s online PC gaming service, and even though the breach has been largely settled, there have been continued attacks on other Sony divisions. Most recently, the company’s official websites in parts of Europe and Asia have been hacked.
While the news of Sony Ericsson’s data breach might have only been a blip on the radar a few months ago, given this context it is a very important piece of news.
Sony has said the Playstation attack alone will cost it more than $3 billion. If this can of worms continues to unfold, though, the company could be looking at much deeper damage at time goes on.
