In an attempt to bolster the security of its online infrastructure following the theft of information on over 70 million PSN accounts, Sony has appointed ex-Homeland Security official Philip Reitinger to oversee network operations.

Reitinger previously served as director of the U.S. National Cyber Security Center. Prior to that he held positions at Microsoft and the U.S. Department of Defense.

He will assume the role of senior vice president in Sony’s security division, which has been on the ropes as of late, reporting directly to general counsel Nicole Seligman. Presumably, the move will bring long-term changes in organization and approach.

“Certainly the network issue was a catalyst for the appointment,” a Sony spokesperson told Reuters. “We are looking to bolster our network security even further.”

After the damaging PSN hacking incident that led to weeks of downtime and left over 70 million accounts compromised, things are finally looking up for Sony. Speaking at the IFA press conference in Germany, Sony CEO Howard Stringer reportedly told those in attendance that over 3 million new accounts have been created since the network intrusion.

What’s more, sales are better than ever. It appears the security blunder has done little to dampen consumer confidence.

“I’m pleased to tell you that the PSN is more secure and better than ever,” said Stringer.

“We are aggressively expanding its content. We have more than 3 million new customers since the network came back online, and sales are exceeding what we had before the cyberattacks.”

A new exploit surfaced earlier today that allowed anyone to reset any PSN account’s password, without going through the proper channels. The new exploit was revealed by our friend Nevada from Nyleveia, who first revealed the exploit. After confirming it’s legitimacy Nevada notified Sony about the threat and their account reset page was subsequently taken down.

The hack involved knowing the date of birth and e-mail of a target account, both of which were compromised in the PSN attack last month. It is unclear how many users were affected by this exploit but those that did use this exploit had their IP addresses logged in which Sony could potentially use to locate and find the culprits (assuming they didn’t use a proxy). It is unclear when the service will resume.

It’s come to light that the hackers responsible for infiltrating Sony’s PSN infrastructure took extra steps to cover their tracks — using Amazon’s EC2 service as a proxy to conduct their malicious deeds. While the hackers did not break into Amazon’s network, they did sign-up using fake details, which has prompted an investigation from the FBI’s cyber crime unit.

As part of its ongoing investigation, sources say the FBI will likely serve a subpoena to Amazon to gain access to usage history for the services used,  in addition to payment details — as Amazon’s EC2 services require a valid credit card.

The PSN still remains out of commission, 3 weeks and counting, despite Sony stating that it was hopeful the service would return in a “few days” last Tuesday.

Amazon Server Said to Be Used in Sony Attack [Bloomberg]

A pair of so-called ‘veterans’ of the loosely associated internet congregation that is Anonymous have told the Financial Times that one of its supporters is likely behind the recent intrusion into Sony’s PSN infrastructure. This comes despite recent denials from those involved in OpSony, an organized Anonymous staged DDOS attack on Sony’s servers that transpired just weeks ago.

“If you say you are Anonymous, and do something as Anonymous, then Anonymous did it. Just because the rest of Anonymous might not agree with it, doesn’t mean Anonymous didn’t do it.” said one hacker, who goes under the online handle of Kayla.

Earlier this week, Sony told the U.S. Congress that its team of security experts found a file planted one of the infiltrated SOE servers, which read “We Are Legion.” While it would seemingly implicate Anonymous, the reality is that anyone could have placed it there, even someone not involved with recent Anon operations. Sony, of course, realizes this.

Another Anon ‘member’ — Barrett Brown – agrees, stating that the file could have been planted to veer negative publicity towards Anonymous.

Really, this is all a matter of hackers pointing the finger at each other. No one actually ‘speaks’ for Anonymous.

Sony Computer Entertainment chief Kaz Hirai has issued a lengthy 8-page response to concerns raised by the U.S. Congress earlier last week over the recent PSN security breach, which has left a total of 101 million accounts compromised. In the letter, Hirai sheds light on particulars of Sony’s findings, including a file planted by the attackers that read ‘We are Legion,’ an Anonymous tagline.

“We discovered that the intruders had planted a file on one of our Sony Online Entertainment servers named “Anonymous” with the words “We are Legion,” noted Hirai. more »

Sony has come forward with an update on the PlayStation Network security breach that left 77 million accounts compromised, announcing that services will resume this week. more »

Looks like the PSN blackout may continue through this weekend, as the recent breach has led Sony to reevaluate its entire security system. According to spokesperson Patrick Seybold, the company is in the middle of a complete revamp “to further strengthen [the PSN] network infrastructure.” As you’d expect, such a task is no small undertaking, and Sony is not yet able to provide an ETA as to when services will resume.

Whatever the extent of this ‘external intrusion’ was, we reckon it must have been pretty serious for Sony to take such a drastic action. More details as they come in. more »

Today Sony issued an official statement on its blog stating that an ‘external intrusion’ led to shutting down PSN services on Wednesday evening. An investigation of the breach is ongoing, with corporate communications director Patrick Seybold promising more updates as additional information comes in. Here’s the statement in full: more »