PSN back up (partially) a month after hacker attack

(CBS/AP) TOKYO - Sony is finally restoring service to its troubled PlayStation Network roughly a month after a massive security breach that affected more than 100 million online accounts caused the company to shut the online gaming service down.

Restored operations have begun in the United States and Europe. But for now those services are limited to online gaming, chat and music streaming.

Sony said it aims to fully restore the PlayStation Network by the end of May.

PSN is a system that links gamers worldwide in live play. Sony shut it down on April 20 after discovering a hacker attack.

Sony said personal data, including credit card numbers, may have been stolen. But the company said Sunday it had not received any reports of the stolen information being used illegally.

Kazuho Hirai, chief of Sony Corp.'s PlayStation video game unit, said in a statement that the company has beefed up security measures to protect customers' personal data.

"While we understand the importance of getting our services back online, we did not rush to do so at the expense of extensively and aggressively testing our enhanced security measures," Hirai said

Complete coverage of the PlayStation network attack on Crimesider