Analyzing Sony’s reaction to the PSN meltdown

Sony has a difficult road ahead of them. After weathering one of gaming’s most titanic disasters, they’ve lost a lot of good will. That can spell disaster for any company. It’s far worse for ones built on fierce consumer loyalty. Customers aren’t going to leave the Playstation 3 for Xbox. They have too much invested in games and hardware. It’s the future that matters, especially with Sony having a new console on the horizon.

A lot the grief could have been avoided through better planning and better PR. Sony got complacent about security. Rumours has it that their pre-meltdown server software was hopelessly outdated. I think a lot of big companies adopt an unspoken “it can’t happen to us” mentality. We don’t live in a world where hackers spam your inbox. Those days are long gone. Cyber-criminals have bigger fish to fry. Any system that connects to public internet is vulnerable to hacking. No amount of security can prevent that.

If you can’t prevent break-ins, you have to rely on strong communication between corporate and customer. Sony failed again on this front. They sat on their hands upon discovering customer data was stolen. Thieves were sitting pretty for almost a week before Sony finally admitted credit card numbers were taken. Notices should have gone out immediately.

Sony finally did the right thing in the end by offering up some nice freebies. However, this still doesn’t excuse their carelessness with sensitive data. Even following the disaster, people are still unsure what security improvements have been made. This is why the Japanese government is refusing to allow PSN to be restored in that country. If anything, this should be a wake up call for all organizations that do business online. Sony’s reaction to their meltdown is a model of exactly what not to do.

The fallout will not be felt immediately. Over the next few months, sales of the PS3 and the upcoming NGP will tell the whole tale. If fans and potential customers jump ship to the competition, it could do a lot of harm to Sony’s gaming division. Once goodwill is lost, it’s hard to win back.