Sony has locked down 93,000 user accounts across the Sony Entertainment, PlayStation and Sony Online Entertainment networks in response to an attempted hacker attack. Hackers attempted to log in to a “massive” number of accounts with user ID and password combinations obtained from an unknown third-party source. The last major attack on the network, in which the account information of 77 million users was compromised, brought down the entire PlayStation Network for several weeks last spring and cost an estimated $170 million.

In other bad news for the company, Sony also recalled 1.6 million Bravia flat-panel TVs sold worldwide since 2007 because a faulty component may cause them to melt or catch fire.

We used Social Radar to analyze conversations around both topics related to Sony online.

Sony buzz

Buzz around Sony more than doubled this week.

Sony conversation topic cloud

Nearly every current topic of conversation around Sony is related to either the PlayStation Network hacker attack or the Bravia TV recall.

Will Microsoft XBox use social media to engage with frustrated PlayStation users to steal market share?

Citigroup said today that a cyber attack in May affected almost twice as many accounts as the bank’s figures had initially suggested. A total of 360,083 North American Citigroup credit card accounts were affected by the breach, the third-largest U.S. bank by assets.

Citigroup chatter

Chatter around Citigroup is currently at its highest point of the year.

Citigroup sentiment

Chatter around Citi or Citigroup is currently 34% negative, and the word hacker is appearing in more than 14% of conversations.

Citigroup is the latest in a growing list of companies to face cyber attacks in recent months, with Sony, Google Inc and Lockheed Martin all having suffered under hackers this year. Hacker group LulzSec, which recently claimed responsibility for high-profile attacks against Sony and Nintendo, says it successfully attacked the U.S. Senate’s website over the weekend.

Sony announced a new handheld gaming system this week that it claims will revolutionize the portable entertainment experience.

The new PlayStation Vita was unveiled as part of Sony’s presentation on the eve of the Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles.

The Vita marks Sony’s biggest advance in the handheld gaming space since it introduced the Sony PSP in 2006. The Vita doesn’t feature 3D gaming, like rival Nintendo’s 3DS, but the dual cameras will be used in another emerging video-game space — augmented reality.

PlayStation Vita vs. Sony PSP chatter

The unreleased PlayStation Vita is already generating more buzz than the established Sony PSP.

PlayStation sentiment

Sentiment around PlayStation is at its most positive point of the month. Conversations around PlayStation are currently 85% positive, after dipping to 35% positive during the hacker PlayStation Network fiasco.

Now that the PlayStation Network is back in action and the Vita is generating positive buzz, has Sony regained the consumer confidence?

News broke today that Apple will start its annual Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) with several important software releases: iCloud, Apple’s upcoming cloud service, as well as the next iteration of its desktop and mobile platform, Mac OS X Lion and iOS 5.

The really big announcement at this year’s June 6 WWDC will be iCloud, which is rumored to be Apple’s cloud service for music. Recent reports said that Apple has signed a licensing deal with EMI and was close to signing similar deals with Sony and Universal, which would pave the way for iCloud.

WWDC buzz

Chatter around Apple’s WWDC is already up 426%, still a week away from the conference.

WWDC sentiment

Conversations around WWDC are currently 83% positive. Steve Jobs is currently being mentioned in 11% of WWDC posts after speculation that he would participate in the keynote.

We will report back next week following the conference to break down the buzz.

Nintendo reported yesterday plans to cut the price of its Wii console to $150 as soon as May 15. Over the past year, Wii sales have slowed considerably. Nintendo revealed earlier this year that it sold about 7 million Wii units in the U.S. in 2010. It had sold more than 10 million units in 2008 and about 9 million units in 2009. The Wii has trailed the Xbox 360 so far this year in overall sales.

Wii chatter

The price drop generated a small increase in chatter. However, we noticed a much higher spike in chatter around Wii conversations on April 25. Further analysis showed us that Nintendo announced plans to release Wii 2 in 2012 that day.

Wii vs. PlayStation vs. Xbox

As we posted yesterday, PlayStation has been facing increased negative buzz due to its hacked PlayStation Network. Regardless, Xbox has generated the highest amount of buzz overall throughout the last month.

Sony told U.S. lawmakers that an intruder left a taunting message for the company in a recent computer attack but it still doesn’t know who stole personal information for more than 100 million of its PlayStation Network online-gaming accounts. Sony said the hackers deleted any traces of their attack, which is regarded as one of the biggest-ever data breaches.

Sony sentiment

Negative chatter spiked to its highest point yesterday, 58% negative.

Will users be able to trust Sony again? Will we see a trend in massive data breaches? Will you think twice before entering personal information online?

As we move into day 11 of the PlayStation Network fiasco, Sony continues to rebuild its beleaguered network while apologizing profusely to users.

Sony believes hackers obtained user account information, including home addresses, email addresses, birth dates, usernames and passwords and potentially even credit card numbers.

PlayStation chatter

Apparently some users don’t appreciate what they have until its gone. Chatter around PlayStation is up 79% as more news about the outage is revealed.

PlayStation sentiment

PlayStation sentiment, which is generally between 80-90% positive, spiked up to 65% negative.

XBox sentiment

Meanwhile, XBox sentiment is currently 81% positive. Can Microsoft XBox capitalize on Sony’s PlayStation Network woes and steal market share?

Google officially introduced Google TV to the public on October 4, and Sony unveiled its newest line of Internet-enabled TVs complete with Google TV software this week. Google TV joins Apple TV, Boxee Box and Roku in the set top box market attempting to change the way consumers watch TV. Check out a list comparing available apps for all four services.

We used Social Radar to run analysis on Google TV, Apple TV, Boxee Box and Roku. Despite the announcement and the buzz, Google TV chatter pales in comparison to Roku chatter.

Google TV has been generating the most buzz among these new Web TV solutions, far above Apple TV. Though Apple is seemingly no longer making Apple TV their “hobby”, they have certainly failed to dominate the buzz in this market as they tend to do with all of their other products.

Though all solutions have very positive conversation, Apple TV has also received the lowest of the four.

We also broke down the distribution of chatter among hot conversation topics around Web TV solutions.

You can see among movies and TV shows conversation, Apple TV dominates the conversation. Google TV is more commonly discussed around conversations about music, Netflix and videos. Another surprise is that Roku, though created by Netflix, receives less conversation market share among Netflix conversations than Apple TV or Google TV. However, Roku does dominate the market share among Hulu references.

Though it’s still quite early to see if there’s a clear winner in this new race, the common variable is that these solutions are all well received. As they become more common in the home, we’ll keep an eye on how the conversation changes.

The Social Radar Top 50 measures the brands with the most active Web presence based on overall online conversation volume. To create the Top 50 list, we used Social Radar to analyze millions of blog posts, news feeds, forums, social networks and Twitter posts to aggregate a list of the words and brands mentioned most frequently on the Web during all of 2008 and 2009. The list measures the number of unique individuals or sources that posted content about each brand during 2009 rather than the overall number of mentions, which would be more heavily influenced by big fans who post frequently about a specific brand.

This year has certainly been interesting. Several new brands made their way to the mainstream making our 2009 Top 50 list, such as Kindle, Amazon’s hit e-book reader, and Android, Google’s mobile OS that is spreading onto smartphones like wildfire. Interestingly, Samsung and Nokia took a big hit this year, as sexier smartphones such as iPhones and Android-powered devices from HTC and Motorola gain more attention.

The list certainly shows that 2009 was the year of Social Media. Twitter moved ahead of Google to take the number 1 spot, while Facebook and MySpace made significant leaps over big brands as well. Most video game related brands were down this year as well, including Sony, Wii, Xbox, and Nintendo. It also appears TV brands all jumped this year including Disney, MTV, Fox, BBC, CNN, ESPN, and ABC.

Download the PDF:

View the full list below, or download the PDF. For additional information about how you can analyze chatter sentiment to gauge positivity/negativity, view key words mentioned about your brand and identify key influencers, visit www.infegy.com/socialradar.

Social Radar Screenshot:

Questions or comments? Twitter me @adamcoomes.

The September 2009 Social Radar Top 50 measures the brands with the most active Web presence based on overall online conversation volume. To create the Top 50 list, we used Social Radar to analyze millions of blog posts, news feeds, forums, social networks and Twitter posts to aggregate a list of the words and brands mentioned most frequently on the Web during September 2009. The list measures the number of unique individuals or sources that posted content about each brand during September 2009 rather than the overall number of mentions, which would be more heavily influenced by big fans who post frequently about a specific brand.

Twitter falls a bit, but still takes top spot. LG’s new BL20 Chocolate helped LG jump 11 spots. NFL rises again this month as the NFL season heats up. MTV jumps 13 spots due to buzz around the MTV Video Music awards. AT&T’s announcement of MMS support on the iPhone raised AT&T’s position up 5 spots.

View the full list below, or download the PDF. For additional information about how you can analyze chatter sentiment to gauge positivity/negativity, view key words mentioned about your brand and identify key influencers, visit www.infegy.com/socialradar.

Questions or comments? Twitter me @adamcoomes.