Square Enix was, on the 12th of December, the victim of a calculated security breach. The attack on servers, which contained details of roughly 1.8 million North American and Japanese customers, has caused the publisher to suspend services until they can ascertain to what extent, if any, their security has been compromised.
The company moved to assure customers that no credit card details were lost. A statement released by Square Enix revealed that: "As a result of our continuing investigation into the unauthorized intrusion reported yesterday, Square Enix has now determined that user login credentials were not accessed. Moreover, we have not found evidence that the individual was able to access any personal information at all.
We will be sending an email to all SQUARE ENIX MEMBERS advising that an incident took place. This email will not be requesting any action from you.
We have reported this incident to the Japanese Government.
Because we have decided to conduct a broader internal investigation, it will take a few more days before we make the SQUARE ENIX MEMBERS service available once again. We deeply regret the inconvenience this may have caused our customers and fans, and appreciate your patience."
This web attack is just another in a long list of hacks on interactive entertainment businesses. The recent attack on the PlayStation Network highlighted the threat posed by hackers. Now all we can do is wait to see the extent of this latest attack, however it may be some time before we discover whether this incident is comparable to what happened to Sony.