GAMERS beware - the popular Sony PlayStation website has been compromised by hackers.
Avid gamers here whom my paper spoke to also believe that such breaches in security lower confidence in the company.
Of the millions of gamers in the world, many go to the Sony PlayStation website regularly to check on the latest games being released and new developments to the game console.
Researchers at IT security firm Sophos discovered on Monday that Sony's USA PlayStation website fell victim to a structured query language (SQL) injection attack.
The attack dupes visitors to the infected website to install a fake anti-virus software.
Upon visiting the website, a script pretending to do an online security scan of your computer activates.
After the scan, a message will appear alleging that your computer is infected with a variety of viruses and Trojan horses, scaring you into purchasing a bogus security product.
This is not the first instance that a website fell victim to an SQL injection attack.
Sophos, in a statement yesterday, said that for the past few months, it had detected a number of sites being infected by such attacks.
What makes it especially worrying is that high profile websites with heavy traffic, such as Sony's, are susceptible to hackers.
Said avid gamer and student Evan Foo, 23, who frequents the Sony PlayStation website: "As a consumer, my confidence in the site will definitely drop if it is so easily hacked."
Senior technology consultant for Sophos Graham Cluley said: "Most would never expect that surfing to a website like this could potentially infect them with malware."
