Mega Sega attack affects 1.3m users

Japanese video game developer Sega Corp revealed on Sunday that the personal information of 1.3 million customers had been stolen from its database - the latest in a number of attacks by hacker groups against video game companies.

Information such as names, dates of birth, e-mail addresses and encrypted passwords of users of Sega Pass online network had been compromised, Sega did say through a statement that payment information like credit card details were safe. However, the developer has still shut down Sega Pass.

"We are deeply sorry for causing trouble to our customers. We want to work on strengthening security," said Yoko Nagasawa, a Sega spokesperson, also stating that it was not clear when they would bring Sega Pass back online.

According to Nagasawa Sega Europe, a division of Sega that oversees the Sega Pass network, immediately notified Sega and network customers after the breach was discovered on Thursday.

The attack against Sega follows other recent attacks against companies in the industry like Codemasters, Nintendo and Bethesda.

However, these security breaches are not as significant when compared to what Sony Corp experienced following two high-profile attacks against it's Playstation Network in April.

Those attacks saw the theft of account data for more than 100 million customers, setting it apart as the largest data theft by hackers outside of the financial services sector.

LulzSec, a group of hackers that has carried out cyber attacks against other video game companies including Nintendo, surprisingly offered to help identify and punish the hackers who broke into Sega's database.

"We want to help destroy the hackers attacked. We love the Dreamcast, these people are going down," read a tweet to Sega supposedly from LulSec.