Amazon.com's Web Services were used by hackers in the April attack against Sony’s online entertainment services, according to a Bloomberg report citing a "person with knowledge of the matter."

According to the report, hackers rented a server through Amazon’s EC2 service and launched the attack from that location, according to Bloomberg's source. The source is obviously someone that either knows the hackers that rented the services or an Amazon insider because he or she also said that the account had been shut down.

The development sheds light on how hackers used the so- called cloud to carry out the second-biggest online theft of personal information to date. The incursion, which compromised the personal accounts of more than 100 million Sony customers, was “a very carefully planned, very professional, highly sophisticated criminal cyber attack,” Sony has said.

Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-CT, and the man who once railed against "Beer Pong as Connecticut's Attorney General) said in a statement that Sony's response to the security breach and service disruption on PlayStation Network and Station.com "could serve as a model for other companies facing similar criminal hacking."

Blumenthal also praised Sony's promise to offer a year of identity theft protection to PSN users as a "strong first step toward protecting millions of consumers whose personal and financial information has been compromised."

"While I continue to believe that Sony should have warned users earlier, I am pleased they are providing protective measures including an insurance policy to cover identity theft harms to consumers within a 12-month window -- but I would hope Sony would extend coverage over a longer time on a case-by-case basis if necessary," said the Senator.

C|Net is reporting that Sony is considering offering a reward for information leading to those hackers responsible for breaking into its PlayStation Network and Sony Online Entertainment networks that lead to both services being taken down nearly two weeks ago. According to the report, the company has been kicking around the idea of a reward for a while, but has not yet come to a final decision on the matter. Apparently, they are still weighing the pros and cons of offering such reward. If they do agree on it, the report claims, it will be brought before the company's top executives for approval.

CNET's report adds that any reward would have to be offered in cooperation with various law enforcement agencies around the world investigating the security breach including the FBI.

Sony has not publicly commented on this story.

Even as Sony's online gaming services were being taken down this morning, the PlayStation Blog was updated denying reports that hackers tried to sell back millions of stolen credit cards to the company. Sony's Patrick Seybold said that the reports were false and that no one in the company recalls such an event occurring. The seedy underbelly of the internet where credit cards are bought and sold every day probably disagrees, but that's Sony's official stance on the subject. Of course, if such an offer were made it would not make much sense to buy back a list that would obviously be copied and resold anyways. From the PlayStation Blog:

"We want to state this again given the increase in speculation about credit card information being used fraudulently. One report indicated that a group tried to sell millions of credit card numbers back to Sony. To my knowledge there is no truth to this report of a list, or that Sony was offered an opportunity to purchase the list."

Trip Hawkins, a founder of EA and the CEO of social and mobile game maker Digital Chocolate apparently owes the Internal Revenue Service $20 million. According to a Forbes report, Hawkins tried to use a personal bankruptcy to nullify the debt but a judge rejected it. U.S. District Court judge Jeffrey S. White upheld a lower bankruptcy court ruling related to tax shelters Hawkins has used to hide the personal wealth he gained from founding Electronic Arts nearly three decades ago.

Judge White said in his ruling that Hawkins knew he was insolvent after the IRS disallowed his tax shelters but "continued to spend money extravagantly with knowledge of his (federal and state) tax liabilities." The judge added that "Hawkins planned to defeat his taxes via bankruptcy and continue living the lifestyle to which he had grown accustomed."

A Saudi national who was arrested for plotting to "blow up" former President George W. Bush's Texas home and other targets in America has been connected ever so slightly to violent video games - particularly the Resident Evil series from Capcom. The 20-year-old chemical engineering student at Lubbock's South Plains College, described by authorities as a "jihadist" plead not guilty to charges last Wednesday in a Texas federal court. The charge was attempted use of a weapon of mass destruction. According to an affidavit in the Northern District of Texas, Aldawarsi, who was came to the US in 2008 on a student visa, had allegedly researched how to make a chemical-based, improvised explosive device (IED) online.

The New York Post reports that enjoyed watching game videos from five titles in the Resident Evil series on YouTube - information the paper found while sifting through his blog.

The Federal Trade Commission revealed on Tuesday that it plans to look into "free to play" after several politicians complained about thousands of dollars in transactions initiated unknowingly by young children. The investigation is the result of a letter sent to the agency by Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) complaining about children buying virtual items without their parents' consent (hint: it involves Smurf berries).

FTC chairman Jon Leibowitz responded to Markey that the practice of in-app purchases in iPhone and iPad games "raised concerns" that consumers may not understand the full ramifications of the charges they might face.

Senator Jim DeMint (R-SC) said today that the Federal Communications Commission should be renamed the "Fabricating a Crisis Commission," following its vote to approve new rules to regulate certain aspects of the internet. Later on in a blistering attack of the FCC's actions this week, DeMint said he will push for legislation that limits the power of the FCC to act on its own in enforcing rules.

"Proceeding on its own liberal whims rather than facts, this FCC has chosen to grant itself broad authority to limit how businesses can bring the internet to consumers in faster and more innovative ways," DeMint said in a lengthy statement.

As part of its “Operation In Our Sites” initiative, which targets illegal items distributed via the Internet that “threaten public safety and health,” U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has seized a series of websites for criminal copyright violations.

In conjunction with the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, ICE executed nine seizure warrants against websites, seized domain names, detained assets from 15 banking and associated accounts and enacted four residential search warrants in North Carolina, New Jersey, New York and Washington.

Downloading movies in an “undercover capacity,” led ICE officials to seize the following websites: TVShack.net, Movies-Links.tv, FilesPump.com, Now-Movies.com, PlanetMoviez.com, ThePirateCity.org, ZML.com, NinjaVideo.net and NinjaThis.net. Sites taken over are now decorated with a seizure notice, as illustrated here.

Foxconn is, at least publicly, taking a beating from its clients - whose ranks include Apple, Nokia, Sony, Nintendo and more. Today Nintendo, Nokia and Sony announced in separate statements that they are conducting investigations into reports concerning a number of suicides that have occurred at several Foxconn facilities in China. Companies like Nintendo and Sony use Foxconn to manufacture products and components cheaply. The company owned by Hon Hai Precision Industries employs approximately 430,000.

Some reports have suggested that many of these companies are aware of the low pay, pressure, and bad working conditions that employees of Foxconn face; after all auditors and other company officials frequently check on production quotas and other matters that affect their supply chains.. Earlier in the week Apple, Dell, and Hewlett-Packard issued statements saying that they take working conditions "seriously" and plan to do their own investigations into these matters.

At least two public officials are under scrutiny after purchases of video game products with tax dollars.

In Louisiana, Monroe City Schools Superintendent James Dupree (left) has been called on to explain using his business credit card to purchase a Nintendo DS and two games for $195 at a local GameStop last November.

The News-Star reports that, along with the DS, Dupree bought copies of SAT/ACT Coach and Brain Age Training. In a response to the newspaper's request for records, Dupree wrote:

All items were purchased to pilot their usability for SAT/ACT prep and recall skill building in relation to performance target objective No. 1.

Dupree said yesterday that the DS and games are sitting in his office as he has not yet found the time to use them. After checking them out himself, he plans to pass them along to a student.

Meanwhile, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports that Michael Gobb, former executive director of the Blue Grass Airport in Lexington, Kentucky, has resigned following a spending probe. The state Auditor General's office found more than $500,000 in questionable expenditures by airport execs, including a $4,400 tab at a strip club as well as multiple Nintendo Wii bundles.