The Sony PlayStation Network will be down for thirteen hours on Monday, although most of the downtime will take place during work hours.

Our long national nightmare of being unable to play Portal 2 co-op on PlayStation 3 is nearly over.

Sony has issued a press release detailing a “phased restoration” of PlayStation Network on a region-by-region basis, starting with the Americas, Europe, Australia, New Zealand, and the Middle East. It’s unknown if any functionality will be restored today. Sony expects to have PSN restored everywhere by month’s end.

Hacker collective says it “will not be found liable” in massive data theft; New York State Attorney General launching formal inquiry.

As the PlayStation Network outage enters its 15th day, the alleged culprits behind the accompanying data breach are protesting their innocence. In a press release obtained by the Guardian newspaper, the hacker collective known as Anonymous denied claims by Sony that it was behind the recent intrusion into Sony Online Entertainment servers. It also said it had nothing to do with the PSN attack itself, as Sony implied in a letter sent to congress yesterday.

Hackers claiming to have credit card information stolen from Sony’s PlayStation Network last week are trying to sell them on underground Internet forums, but the veracity of the claims could not be confirmed.