Here's a quick rundown of the Lizard Squad situation:

So it all started because Lizard Squad didn't think Micro$oft's servers were very good. Whether you guys agree with them or not, that's aside the point. So Lizard Squad warned Microsoft that they would be attacked on Christmas day if they didn't upgrade their servers. Well, apparently Micro$oft didn't listen, so Lizard Squad attacked, in the form of a ddos attack, as promised in hopes that Micro$oft would listen, and consider upgrading their servers.

As far as I know, Micro$oft didn't react a whole lot. There was a little bit of activity on various (official?) Xbox accounts, but nothing else more than "Yes, we're aware our services are down, and we're trying to fix them".

Then, around 7 hours ago, Kim Dotcom offered the entire Lizard Squad team free lifetime Meag vouchers if they stopped the attacks. After a bit of negotiating, Lizard Squad agreed to the terms, and stopped the attacks. According to Lizard Squad's twitter, the attacks have stopped. Any services that remain down are simply a result of the aftermath of the attack.

tl;dr: Kim dotcom saved Christmas

Here's a quick rundown of the Lizard Squad situation:

So it all started because Lizard Squad didn't think Micro$oft's servers were very good. Whether you guys agree with them or not, that's aside the point. So Lizard Squad warned Microsoft that they would be attacked on Christmas day if they didn't upgrade their servers. Well, apparently Micro$oft didn't listen, so Lizard Squad attacked, in the form of a ddos attack, as promised in hopes that Micro$oft would listen, and consider upgrading their servers.

As far as I know, Micro$oft didn't react a whole lot. There was a little bit of activity on various (official?) Xbox accounts, but nothing else more than "Yes, we're aware our services are down, and we're trying to fix them".

Then, around 7 hours ago, Kim Dotcom offered the entire Lizard Squad team free lifetime Meag vouchers if they stopped the attacks. After a bit of negotiating, Lizard Squad agreed to the terms, and stopped the attacks. According to Lizard Squad's twitter, the attacks have stopped. Any services that remain down are simply a result of the aftermath of the attack.

tl;dr: Kim dotcom saved Christmas [/quote]
But, shouldn't these hackers go to jail?[/quote]
If they can be caught...[/quote]
If the hackers were received free vouchers, would you think they where caught?
And be thankful they didnt hack steam. i PROBABLE would of flipped out.

Think your internet is slow? click this link
http://www.speedtest.net/result/3967290496.png
#QuotesRbroke

I agree with you, agreeing with Anonymous, but do you think if the Lizard Squad and the Finest Squad are the same thing, have they been fooling with the anonymous group this whole time? Do you think they (Lizard) will go after a bigger company or another gaming company and try to hack them next?

Xbox isn't any better yet. There are reports now that people's Xbox's are freezing on start-up. Happened to me too. But according to CBC and a few other news channels, the FBI is on the case. The Lizard Squad's Twitter is taken down now. Still hoping my Xbox gets fixed though =/

Not 100% sure, but I believe it's because of various illegal activities that people use Tor for. I think I know the specifics, but I can't post them here...

Have the nerve to charge you for internet
Then shouldn't you be angry at your ISP as well, they are charging you for internet!
Dont worry, Sony adopted it too for the PS4! nintendo still does not, so lets all go to the wii!

Its business, most major *GAMING* companies do it, besides valve. Microsoft is an amazing company. They changed computing and we probably wouldnt be here if it wasn't for companies like Microsoft, you may hate them, but in reality, they helped shape the industry. Most people dont hate them, 90% of computers run windows or run Microsoft software.

Tor seems to still be up... for now...

Lizard Squad had attacked Tor a few days ago I believe. The way it worked was that Lizard Squad became a part of the network with a few "nodes" (source). This pretty much sent users information to Lizard Squad and jeopardized users' ability to be anonymous. This included anything from users browsing history, to important account information (I believe). According to Tor, this attack was small enough that there wasn't anything to worry about, and have since then attempted to remove the fake nodes.

The tweet from Lizard Squad is pretty much saying that another attack will be made on Tor with over 3000 relays (some of which may be Sonys own servers).

My opinion? According to Tor, thousands of new relays still only make up 1% of the entire Tor network. This means that 3000 new relays still wouldn't be enough to jeopardize Tor's users. However, I'd still recommend staying away from using Tor for the next few days...

They didn't "hack into" PSN or XBL, but that's aside the point. They attack Sony and Micro$oft to prove two points. That they could do it, and that Micro$oft and Sony need to upgrade their servers.

Haha, I like this.

In other news, I found a supposed interview of Lizard Squad members. It's extremely biased though. VERY biased. Like so biased I now hate that interviewer whoever he may be...

We're talking about hacking, not custom Minecraft clients.

Honestly, it really doesn't matter if it was hacking or DDoSing.

Thank you!! Though, from what I've read, hacking was involved. Not in the DDoS attack itself, but I had heard that they gained access to servers with 100 gigabit connections and used them for the attack.

As an owner of a 15gbps network and small database center,

Hacking, in technical terms, is considered an act of using technology in a way to better or weaken software or network and many other things, though this is the main idea of it.

Sony & Microsoft were ddosed by Lizard Squad, which they obtained the power of the DDoS by hacking and using malicious software to create a bot-net. They also hacked into servers before and obtained and stolen documents, redirects and many other things.

There is indeed hacking involved in DDoS attacks due to the very nature of how you use the resources to your disposal. You can't just attack using your home network, it doesn't work.

That's if you want to look at the negative side of things. Now look at the good side of things.

If a few random people can attack Microsoft and Sony and cause a bit of damage, then think of the damage that could be done with everybody's accounts that are on these servers. I believe that LizardSquad did these attacks for three reasons. You can choose to agree, or disagree.

1. To prove that it can be done, and that both companies need to look into preventing these types of situations. LizardSquad has stated that these attacks are preventable. Ddos attacks are constantly being attempted against these companies, and the only way to raise awareness of them is to show that it can be done.

2. To prove that Microsoft has a better infrastructure than Sony. Microsoft had been able to get their servers back up and running within a few hours. However, for Sony, it's been 24 hours and their servers still aren't up. Sony's servers are also very vulnerable. This is obvious from the recent password stealing from Sony, as well as LizardSquad's ddosing. Even more recently and terrifying is that LizardSquad also supposedly obtained a CA from Sony during the attack. That's pretty scary stuff...

3. For the laughs, and a bit of money. I'll admit it. LizardSquad probably had a lot of fun with this, and it gave them a challenge. They also supposedly made close to half a million dollars from the attack. Whether this was in the original plan or not, I'm not sure.

Imo, you have a pretty sad life if Christmas is ruined because you can't fully use your gifts for a day or two...

This is a place to discuss your opinions. If you voice your opinion, you can always expect somebody to voice theirs. If that's something you're not ok with, then goodbye.