Hasta La Gadget!

A UK government agency has slapped Sony’s wrist with a £250,000 ($400,000) penalty for not doing enough to protect the personal information of its customers. The fine specifically concerns the large-scale PSN hack in April 2011, which the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) says “could have been prevented.” The agency’s head, David Smith, said that the security measures Sony had in place “were simply not good enough.” He added that Sony trades on its technical know-how, and had access to the necessary expertise to protect itself from criminal attacks:

“There’s no disguising that this is a business that should have known better.”

Though the size of the fine might seem piddling for an outfit like Sony, the ICO considers it to be a “substantial” punishment, reflecting the fact that this case is “one of the most serious” that has ever been reported to it. Check out David Smith’s statement and best angry teacher face in the video after the break.

Update: Sony Computer Entertainment Europe emailed us to say that it plans to appeal the decision. The company also agrees with the ICO’s findings that although it was the victim of a focused criminal attack, it was unlikely that personal data accessed was used for “fraudulent purposes”.

Filed under: Gaming, Internet, Sony

Comments

Source: ICO

Chalk up another potential win for AMD. The latest report on the next PlayStation console (courtesy of Kotaku), allegedly codenamed “Orbis,” puts AMD at the heart of both CPU and GPU: an eight core AMD64 CPU and an AMD R10XX GPU are said to drive the system. That’s at least the dev kit that the site’s tipster has as of right now, but those specs — yes, even biggies like these — could change completely by retail availability. Should AMD remain the CPU/GPU manufacturer, both Nintendo’s Wii U and the next PlayStation will be powered by AMD chips; not too shabby for a company that’s been bleeding talent. The rumors we’ve seen of the next Xbox also point to x64 architecture, but it’s unclear whether that’ll be supplied by AMD or another manufacturer. If those rumors pan out however, it would mean that a single unified architecture would power two of the major gaming consoles as well your laptop and desktop — something that would have been unthinkable just a few years ago. (And would open up a world of possibilities.)

We’re inclined to trust the current specs of the dev kit, as they’re said to be sourced from “official Orbis documentation … a hive of more than 90 PDFs about the forthcoming console.” One slide culled from that official documentation also outlines Sony’s vision of user accounts, allowing multiple Sony Entertainment Network accounts to be signed in simultaneously (thus allowing for individual Trophies, and potentially cloud saves, among other uses). The piece also details a new controller — though it is noted that the current dev kit supports both DualShock 3 and Sixaxis controllers (and the image above shows a Move, so probably that too) — which is supposedly known as “the Orbis Development Tool.” It’s said to resemble the DualShock, albeit with the addition of a capacitive touchpad — a rumor also posited by some UK outlets earlier this week.

Whether any of this is actually true is another question altogether, and we can’t be sure until Sony gives official word. It sounds like some form of information isn’t too far off — E3 perhaps? Regardless, head over to Kotaku for the alleged full (current) list of specs on the dev kit and even more speculation.

Filed under: Gaming, HD, Sony, AMD

Comments

Source: Kotaku

Think this, but without that Move adapter on top.

We’ve been hearing a lot of news lately concerning Sony’s PlayStation 4, which we might officially hear more about by May. But until Sony delivers the goods, we’ll just have to wait and speculate and report on rumors that come from credible sources. Such as this next story involving the PlayStation 4′s controller.

According to CVG sources, Sony is expected to ditch the DualShock controller design they’ve been slightly modifying for the past sixteen years with the original DualShock controlling debuting with the PlayStation. The PlayStation 4′s controller will include biometric sensors on the grips of the controller and an LCD touchscreen.

An additional source says PlayStation engineers are “trying to emulate the same user interface philosophies as the PS Vita.”

It seems whatever Sony is planning for the PlayStation 4 will offer similar functionality to the Wii U’s GamePad, which may once again change how gamers play their games and interact with their console seeing how a touchscreen controller seems to be planned for the upcoming console. Although, just like the Wii U, having a DualShock controller be compatible with the PlayStation 4 isn’t completely out of the question as they may interact with the system as well, similar to how the Wii Remotes interact with the Wii U.

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: PS4 Hinted To Be Announced During Pre-E3 2013 Event [Rumor], Disney Patents Hint At Future Making Game Consoles [Rumor],

Sony has been rocking its DualShock controller design ever since the original PlayStation was out in full force, but while the console launched in the US in 1995, the DualShock technology didn’t make its way to the market until 1998. Now, it looks like the company will be waving farewell to the classic design for something a little more modern and high tech with the rumored PlayStation 4.

According to Computer and Video Games, an anonymous source that works at a “senior game studio” that’s working on an upcoming Sony game has said that Sony will be introducing a new controller design with its next console, and will introduce some new features to the controller, like a touchscreen and biometric sensors.

It’s said that experimentation and testing of potential controller designs has been extensive in Sony’s research and development department. A second source connected to Sony said that engineers are “trying to emulate the same user interface philosophies as the PlayStation Vita,” which points to possible touchscreen capabilities with the new PS4 controller.

While the DualShock design may be on its way out the door, it’s possible that Sony will still support the PS3 controllers when they release their new console, similar to how the Nintendo Wii U still supports older Wiimotes, so there’s a possibility that older DualShock controllers could be used as secondary controllers on the PS4, but of course, Sony has declined to comment on the rumors.

[via Computer and Video Games]

PlayStation 4 rumored to ditch DualShock controller design is written by Craig Lloyd & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

You might say the day is never really done in consumer technology news. Your workday, however, hopefully draws to a close at some point. This is the Daily Roundup on Engadget, a quick peek back at the top headlines for the past 24 hours — all handpicked by the editors here at the site. Click on through the break, and enjoy.

Continue reading The Daily Roundup for 01.16.2013

Comments