Sony Corporation said on Tuesday that the all PlayStation Network services in the Middle East would be restored by the end of this week.
The company will also resume Music Unlimited powered by Qriocity for PlayStation3 (PS3), PSP(PlayStationPortable), VAIO and other PCs, it said in a statement.
Sony discovered unusual activity on its PlayStation Network, which enables games console owners to download games, chat with friends and pit their skills against rivals, on April 19.
It shut down the network and its Qriocity online music and movie service, frustrating many users, but waited almost a week before alerting users to the extent of the security leak.
The company later found out that a separate online games service had also been penetrated, allowing access to another 25 million user accounts.
“We have been conducting additional testing and further security verification of our commerce functions in order to bring the PlayStation Network completely back online so that our fans can again enjoy the first class entertainment experience they have come to love,” said Kazuo Hirai, executive deputy president, Sony Corporation.
“We appreciate the patience and support shown during this time.”
The company will be offering customers a “welcome back” package of services and premium content to all registered PlayStation Network and Qriocity account services, he added.
The first phase of PlayStation Network and Qriocity restoration began on May 15 when the company brought partial services back online.
Gamers and security experts had criticised Sony for its handling of the incident, which sparked lawsuits and cast a shadow over its plans to combine the strengths of its content and hardware products via online services.
The Japanese electronics and entertainment giant apologised to customers for the outage, and said a range of new security measures had been introduced. These included an early warning system that could alert the company to any attempt to penetrate the network.
But some users have said the prolonged outage has prompted them to switch to rival Microsoft’s Xbox Live games service.
In what is thought to be the biggest security breach of its kind, hackers accessed personal information on 77 million PlayStation Network and Qriocity accounts, 90 percent of which are in North America and Europe, and may have stolen credit card information.
Follow us on
