A survival guide

Sony has admitted that account details, logins and online IDs for registered Sony PlayStation Network users, as many as 77 million people, have been compromised. The information was stolen sometime between April 17 and 19, according to a Sony blog post, as early as nine days previously Sony notified its users of the breach. Even worse, the company says it can't be sure whether credit card information was stolen.

The admission came near a week afterwards Sony pulled the plug on PSN and its Qriocity music service, blaming the outage on an "external intrusion" into Sony's network. Sony says that it is rebuilding the PSN and Qriocity server system with improved security. Both services are expected to be operational within the straightway week.

The following user information

Sony said the following user information was compromised: your name, address, country, e-mail address, birth date, PlayStation Network/Qriocity password and login, and handle/PSN online ID.

Sony is as well warning users to be wary of people calling or e-mailing you for extra information just as your Social Security number or other personal information. Sony says it will never call you asking you to verify your information. You should as well be wary of people claiming to be from other companies or services looking to verify your personal data.

Many people often use one difficult password across multiple online accounts, because it's easier to memorize just one set of credentials. If that sounds like you, I highly recommend you try a password manager just as LastPass or KeePass. That way you can use as many difficult passwords as you want without having to memorize all of them. If you use multiple devices while the day just as a laptop, desktop, tablet and smartphone, you may want to look for a password manager that has software available on all the platforms you use.

Added dose of security

For an added dose of security, you can as well use two-factor authentication on accounts that support them. Two-factor authentication really means your account requires a randomly generated password to boot to your regular password previously you can access your account. The second password is mostly generated by an extra piece of software, authenticated by you, on a keychain dongle or smartphone app. This makes it harder for hackers to break into your online accounts.

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