It appears that a new lawsuit has been filed against Sony on Monday, June 20th, in a federal court located in San Diego. The lawsuit avers that two weeks prior to the attack on the PlayStation Network, Sony fired "a substantial percentage" of the employees in the Sony Online Entertainment section of the company, which happens to include those working in its Network Operations Center, which is responsible for "preparing for, and responding to, security breaches." Apparently, Sony did this as a "strategic decision to reduce costs and streamline its global workforce."

This is where things get interesting. After laying off these employees, Sony installed the appropriate firewalls and other security measures to defend its own sensitive data. However, they did not do the same for customer data (more attempts to save money, a lack of care for their customers, or a very large, overlooked business mistake?). The breach of the PlayStation Network is just one of the more recent "attacks against high-profile firms, including defense contractor Lockheed Martin and Google Inc."

We all know what happened next; the PlayStation Network was breached, customer info was exposed, and the network was shutdown to prevent further damage. Every single aspect of the network was down for 23 days, starting in April to early May, and little by little was started up again.

Had Sony not fired those employees two weeks prior, is it possible that this crippling attack could have been prevented? It's hard to say for sure, and the only thing we can do is guess.

Not much is being revealed on the lawsuit, but more information will be posted as the lawsuit progresses and more info becomes available.