The wheels of the US justice system are turning slowly, but they’ve finally found compensation for those affected by the 2011 PlayStation Network hack and resulting service outage. Thanks to a legal settlement resulting from a class action lawsuit, U.S. residents who were members of the PlayStation Network, owned a Sony Online Entertainment game, or subscribed to music service Qriocity between January 1 and May 15, 2011, can now file a claim for compensation.
For most users, that compensation comes in the form of digital goods, including a free PS3 theme, three months of PlayStation Plus (only available to new subscribers), and/or a downloadable code for one of the following PS3/PSP games.
- Dead Nation (PS3)
- Notorious (PS3)
- Little Big Planet (PS3)
- Super Stardust HD (PS3)
- rain (PS3)
- Puppeteer (PS3)
- Invizimals: Lost Kingdom (PS3)
- God of War® HD (PS3)
- Siphon filter: Dark Mirror (PSP)
- Little Big Planet (PSP)
- Mod Nation Racers (PSP)
- Patapon 3 (PSP)
- WipEout Pure (PSP)
Users who previously took a free game from Sony’s “Welcome Back” promotion when the PSN service returned in 2011 can choose from one of the digital reward options. Others can choose up to two. Users can get an additional digital reward if they can prove they did not access Netflix or Hulu Plus subscriptions during the 23 days PSN was out of service.
For those who don’t trust PSN at all after the hack, Sony offers the option to cancel your account and pay out the balance of your PSN wallet. Separately, users who can prove their identity was stolen as a direct result of the PSN hack can claim up to $2,500 in damages to offset out-of-pocket costs associated with that identity theft.
While users around the world were affected by the PSN hack and outage, this settlement is only available to people in the US. Users have until August 31, 2015 to file a claim.