PlayStation accounts are being ‘permanently suspended’ and no one knows why

By wazup on December 5, 2023 Comments Closed / 86 views

PlayStation gamers report being locked out of their accounts and games on PS4 and PS5 without any clear reasoning.

By Jay Peters, a news editor who writes about technology, video games, and virtual worlds. He’s submitted several accepted emoji proposals to the Unicode Consortium.

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Many PlayStation Network users reported Monday that their accounts were unexpectedly permanently suspended.

“This account is permanently suspended from PlayStation Network due to violations of the PlayStation Network Terms of Service and User Agreement,” Sony said in a message to one user. A user on Reddit reported getting a similar message, and a look at PlayStation accounts on Facebook and Instagram shows dozens of people who’ve received similar notices in the last few hours. I’ve also seen reports from the gaming forum ResetEra and from Verge readers who wrote into our tips inbox.

Some who have received these suspensions are understandably distraught, as they may have spent a lot of money on digital PlayStation games that they no longer have access to.

Sony hasn’t publicly acknowledged the issues. There’s nothing about any problems listed on Sony’s “important notices” PlayStation support page, and the company hasn’t posted about them on its PlayStation or Ask PlayStation social accounts on X (formerly Twitter). The company didn’t immediately reply to our request for comment.

It’s unclear how widespread the problems are. I booted up my PS5 and was able to jump into Baldur’s Gate 3 and Fortnite just like I normally would, and I was also able to log into the iOS PlayStation app without seeing a ban.