PlayStation Gamers Rejoice as Network Gets Back Online

— -- Gamers are rejoicing as Sony's PlayStation network is back online following an attack that knocked the gaming system offline for three days after Christmas.

"From time to time there may be disruptions in service due to surges in traffic, but our engineers will be working to restore service as quickly as possible," Sony said in a statement.

The news that the gaming network was returning to normal was welcomed by gamers, many of whom were unable to play with their new holiday gifts.

Microsoft's Xbox Live and Sony's PlayStation Network both suffered distributed denial of service attacks over Christmas perpetrated by a hacker group called the Lizard Squad.

The attacks are designed to flood the networks with artificial traffic, ultimately disrupting connectivity and knocking the systems offline for thousands of gamers around the world.

Sony advised users who were having trouble logging into their PlayStation consoles to reboot and try logging in again.

When it comes to holiday villains both real and fictional, go ahead and add Lizard Squad to the list that includes the Grinch and Ebenezer Scrooge.

The group, which tweeted it was responsible for the atacks, has continued to bask in the glow of what many would call a crime against Christmas.

It seems all it took for Lizard Squad to call off the attacks on Friday was a little diplomacy from MegaUpload founder Kim Dotcom.

Under the deal, Lizard Squad said it reached with Dotcom, the group received 3,000 premium MegaPrivacy vouchers from Dotcom's company, which allows it end-to-end encryption and secure storage services.