Anonymous: 'For Once We Didn't Do It'

Anonymous -- the group credited with taking down security vendor HBGary Federal and defending WikiLeaks by attacking websites of its perceived enemies -- says it has nothing to do with the network trouble crippling Sony's PlayStation site despite having declared a cyber jihad against the company.

TIPS: 7 ways to avoid getting hacked by Anonymous

"For once we didn't do it," reads a message on the site that is used by the organization to post its activities.

But since Anonymous is a loose collective of hackers, the posting also leaves open the possibility that individual members are to blame. "While it could be the case that other Anons have acted by themselves, AnonOps was not related to this incident and takes no responsibility for it," a posting reads.

Anonymous did claim responsibility for earlier attacks against the PlayStation site, but relented after it decided it was more crippling to innocent gamers who just happen to like PlayStations than it was to Sony itself.

The PlayStation official blog isn't saying exactly what the problem is with the site, but whatever it is will keep the site out of action for a day or two. "Please stay tuned to this space for more details, and we'll update you again as soon as we can," says the blog, written by Patrick Seybold, Sony's senior director of corporate communications and social media.

The Sony outage is bad timing for PlayStation because it was launching new versions of several games.

Read more about wide area network in Network World's Wide Area Network section.

This story, "Anonymous: 'For Once We Didn't Do It'" was originally published by Network World.