Sony has announced that all PlayStation Plus members will automatically receive an additional five days of service following a global outage that disrupted the PlayStation Network (PSN) for approximately 18 hours over the weekend.
In a statement on Sunday, the Japanese electronics and entertainment conglomerate confirmed that network services had been fully restored. “Network services have fully recovered from an operational issue. We apologise for the inconvenience and thank the community for their patience,” the company said in a post on X. However, Sony did not disclose the cause of the disruption.
The outage, which commenced late on Friday, left users unable to sign in, play online games, or access the PlayStation Store. By Saturday evening, Sony reported that PSN had been restored.
PSN is a critical component of Sony’s gaming division, providing online services to millions of players worldwide. According to outage tracking site Downdetector.com, the disruption affected around 7,939 users in the United States and approximately 7,336 users in the United Kingdom at its peak on Saturday afternoon.
Many gamers expressed their frustration on social media, with one user posting on X, “PlayStation is back up again after being down for a whole day. Sony at least saved millions of gamers their Sunday right after ruining their Saturday.”
While the recent outage caused considerable disruption, Sony has faced even more severe incidents in the past. In 2014, a cyberattack forced the PlayStation Network offline for several days during the festive season. A more serious security breach in 2011 led to the compromise of personal data belonging to nearly 77 million users, prompting a month-long shutdown and a regulatory investigation.
Despite the inconvenience caused by the latest outage, the offer of compensation is likely to be welcomed by PlayStation Plus subscribers. However, the lack of transparency regarding the cause of the disruption may leave some users seeking further clarity.
(With inputs from Reuters)
