Problems accessing Sony sites were noticed today, one day after Anonymous threatened they would act against the company for its legal actions against the hackers of the PS3.

Did Anonymous’ hackers begin implementing their threats against Sony? A few hours after Anonymous stated they would act against Sony due to its legal battle against the hackers of the PS3 console; disruptions were noticed on the company’s sites and networks.

Disruptions were mostly registered on websites related to PlayStation brand that were unavailable for a few hours. As of writing these lines, the sites are back at work. In addition, gamers reported online about disconnections from the PSN network through which the PSP and PS3 consoles connect to the internet. Sony quickly released a statement saying the network is suffering disconnections due to “planned maintenance”, but since this type of maintenance is usually advertised ahead of time, many believe that Sony is simply trying to hide the real reason the network was down.

However, it must be noted that in all cases, this is still just speculations: Anonymous have not claimed responsibility for any of the mishaps and despite the suspicious proximity to their “war declaration”, this may be pure coincidence and that Sony’s servers suffered unrelated malfunctions.

Sony damaged freedom of speech

Anonymous is the name under which hackers and activists gather. They decided to take on Sony after the latter, they claim, damaged freedom of speech of the hackers who hacked the PS3 with the legal battle it is holding against them. The group claims Sony is acting out of “corporate greed” and that it needs to leave hackers alone and ensure better security for its consoles.

Even if the current malfunctions are not the result of an attack by Anonymous, it can be assumed that Sony’s technical crews are still on alert – Anonymous have a long history of crashing sites they oppose which leads to substantial financial damage of the companies that run these sites.