Sony and Nintendo Drop SOPA Support After Anonymous Hack Threat

Following an ominous threat from Anonymous, Sony and Nintendo have both dropped their support for the controversial Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) bill pending in the U.S. Congress.

SOPA gives the U.S. law enforcement and copyright holders the power to seek court orders against websites accused of enabling or facilitating copyright infringement.

In a YouTube video released in late December, Anonymous addressed Sony, saying in its trademark automated voice that: "Yet again, we have decided to destroy your network...prepare to be extinguished. Justice will be swift and it will be for the people whether some like it or not."

Sony is yet to comment on the threat, and while Sony Computer Entertainment has withdrawn its SOPA support, other Sony branches such as Sony/ATV Music Publishing, Sony Music Entertainment and Sony Music Nashville are all still listed here as supporters of the act.

In the December video, Anonymous also said: "Sony, you have been warned. To those doubting our powers, we have infiltrated the servers of Bank of America, the United Stated Department of Defence, the United Nations and Lockheed Martin in one day."

Opponents of the SOPA bill say that it is internet censorship, will cripple the internet, will threaten whistleblowing websites such as Wikileaks and infringes on First Amendment rights - freedom of speech.

Of the many video games companies that have been hacked in the last 12 months, Sony is the only one to have reported a breach that could have compromised its users' credit card information. The attack crippled the PlayStation Network (PSN) in mid-April 2011 and affected 100 million of the network's users.

In the following months, hacker group LulzSec attacked Sony multiple times, citing Sony's handling of the PSN's outage and on-going cyber weakness as a justification for its actions.