Despite looming threats from cybergangs like the Phantom Squad and Lizard Squad, the Xbox Live service and PlayStation Network (PSN) weren't shut down by any massive distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks.
Both networks had been threatened by the Phantom Squad hacking group earlier this month when it promised to shut down the Microsoft gaming service and the PlayStation Network (PSN) on Christmas Day, but while each suffered from some glitches these were most likely due to internal issues rather than an outside attack.
The threat did have to be taken seriously as the group Lizard Squad took responsibility for Xbox Live and PSN being down on Christmas Day 2014.
The networks did, however, experience some issues on Christmas Day. These included problems in the “purchasing and content usage” and “social and gaming” sections, and Xbox Live and some PSN users had trouble creating new accounts, according to Forbes.
The PSN account creation issues reportedly stemmed, Forbes noted, from Sony having delays sending email verifications to new users. This halted the process for new users to create their accounts until the verification email was received. Microsoft's status site also reportedly listed problems with billing, subscriptions, and other account related issues that hindered the Xbox Live experience though its unclear what caused these issues.
