Gamer's Outpost LLC

By Joe Tidy, Sky News Reporter

A hacker who claims to be behind the Christmas Day cyber attack on computer games consoles has told Sky News he wanted to expose poor security.

The man – known as Ryan – said a group of two or three people masterminded the attack and had no regrets about forcing “a couple of kids to spend their time with their families instead of playing games”.

Ryan – thought to be a member of Lizard Squad – admitted that he and his team of hackers considered the attack a “sort of a game”, and partly did it for their own amusement.

In an interview from Finland, over Skype, with Sky’s Joe Tidy, Ryan said the hacking team was small and included members who were under the age of 20.

“We have massive capability to take down networks like this,” he said.

“This attack was basically done by three people. We had a couple of people from outside the group helping with the attacks, helping us a little bit, but most of the traffic was coming from one or two people.”

Asked why the team carried out the attack, he said: “Mostly to raise awareness – to amuse ourselves.

“Also one of the big aspects here was raising awareness regarding the low state of computer security at these companies.

“Because these companies make tens of millions every month from subscriber fees and that doesn’t even include purchases made by their customers.

“They should have more than enough funding to be able to protect against these attacks.

“And if they can’t protect against the attacks on their core business networks then I don’t think they’re really doing that much on their overall level of security.

“And these customers are still giving these companies their credit card numbers and such.”

Ryan continued: “It is sort of a game for us I have to admit. I completely understand that it’s a bit unethical.

“I’d be rather worried if those people didn’t have anything better to do than play games on their consoles on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.

“I mean I can’t really be (inaudible) feel bad. I might have forced a couple of kids to spend their time with their families instead of playing games.”

The Xbox Live status page said on Saturday that Microsoft services had been restored while PlayStation said it was getting to grips with the issue.

But reassurances the networks were returning to normal were met with a mixed response on social media.

Gaming fan Sho Shallow tweeted: “Finally my PlayStation is working. You lot robbed my Xmas.”

But another user, Steh Abner, wrote: “Woke up in a good mood, but I still can’t get on Xbox, so I am not in a good mood.”

The attack on PlayStation Network and Xbox Live services meant downloaded games could not be played and gamers could not compete against others around the world.