Hack a PS4, and Sony might pay you $50,000

Hack a PS4, and Sony might pay yous $fifty,000

(Image credit: George Dolgikh / Shutterstock.com)

Sony has launched a bug-compensation program to advantage people who notice and study security vulnerabilities affecting PlayStation four and the PlayStation Network.

The Japanese tech behemothic has partnered with bug bounty platform HackerOne to manage the program, and is offering cash rewards at different levels, with the highest, for "critical" flaws in the PS4, starting at $fifty,000.

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The news was confirmed by Sony'south Geoff Norton, who wrote in a blog mail: "At PlayStation, we are committed to providing gamers all over the world with smashing experiences.

"I'm happy to announce today that we have started a public PlayStation Bug Bounty program because the security of our products is a fundamental part of creating amazing experiences for our community," Norton added. "We believe that through working with the security enquiry community we tin deliver a safer place to play."

Norton said the programme was open to the "security research customs, gamers, and anyone else to examination the security of PlayStation four and PlayStation Network".

According to Sony, the scheme predominantly focuses on vulnerabilities affecting the PlayStation iv hardware, operating arrangement, accessories and PlayStation Network.

"For the PlayStation 4 organization, accessories and operating system, we will take submissions on the electric current released or beta version of system software," explained Sony on its HackerOne page.

When it comes to the PlayStation Network, Sony is peculiarly interested in reports of security bug concerning the post-obit domains:

*.playstation.net
*.sonyentertainmentnetwork.com
*.api.playstation.com
my.playstation.com
store.playstation.com
social.playstation.com
transact.playstation.com
wallets.api.playstation.com

Different rewards

Although the plan is geared towards PlayStation 4 flaws, Sony will consider out-of-scope reports too.

Information technology said: "PlayStation may at its discretion accept submissions on earlier versions of system software on a case-by-case ground."

For the rewards, Sony said the amounts "volition differ based on vulnerability severity" and the "quality of the study". It'll merely consider a "previously unreported" vulnerability.

The reward amounts have been categorised by critical, high, medium and depression vulnerabilities, with researchers able to claim rewards starting at $3,000 for critical PlayStation Network vulnerabilities and starting at $fifty,000 for disquisitional PlayStation 4 vulnerabilities.

To alarm Sony of a PS4 security vulnerability and be considered for a cash reward, researchers are asked to create an account on HackerOne and submit a written report via the platform.

In Apr 2011, the PlayStation Network was hacked by still-unknown intruders, who made off with the account records of 77 million users. Sony shut downwardly the network for more 3 weeks while information technology cleaned things up.

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Nicholas Fearn is a freelance technology journalist and copywriter from the Welsh valleys. His work has appeared in publications such equally the FT, the Independent, the Daily Telegraph, The Adjacent Spider web, T3, Android Fundamental, Computer Weekly, and many others. He besides happens to be a diehard Mariah Carey fan!