Sony has locked down up to 93.000 user accounts following an attack on the company’s servers. A similar attack earlier this year took down the PlayStation Network for several weeks.

Hackers attempted to access secure data held on the PlayStation Network, Sony Entertainment Network and the Sony Online Entertainment service using what the company described on the PlayStation Blog as a ‘massive’ set of login IDs and passwords.

Sony’s Chief Information Security Officer, Philip Reitinger, posted a statement to the PlayStation blog which described the attack and the steps Sony is taking to secure their networks.

“We want to let you know that we have detected attempts on Sony Entertainment Network, PlayStation Network and Sony Online Entertainment […] services to test a massive set of sign-in IDs and passwords against our network database.

“As a preventative measure, we are requiring secure password resets for those PSN/SEN accounts that had both a sign-in ID and password match through this attempt. If you are in the small group of PSN/SEN users who may have been affected, you will receive an email from us at the address associated with your account that will prompt you to reset your password.”

A much larger attack in April of this year forced Sony to take the PlayStation Network offline after millions of user accounts were compromised and personal information was stolen from the company’s servers. Sony drew criticism at the time for not reacting quickly enough or acknowledging the problem until it was too late. Reitingier, a former US Homeland Security official, was hired in the wake of that PR disaster, used his statement to advise users on how to choose secure passwords and to be vigilant for ‘unusual’ activity in their accounts.