Pud consoles: Russians blocked on PS5 won't be able to create new accounts

The May wave of blockages of Russian users on the PlayStation Network is not the last, it is just one of the many stages in the fight against Russian gamers, industry experts said. The restrictions apply to user accounts that have accounts registered in several countries at once. Poland and Ukraine are among the most popular, where Russian is often supported, as well as Argentina and Turkey due to their regional prices. The blocking is systemic in nature and has affected a large number of residents of the Russian Federation. The threat to those who have already been sanctioned and those who still use such accounts is described in the Izvestia article.

Blocking Russian players

The latest wave of Russian account blockages began on May 8 and continues to this day. First of all, those accounts that are created in large quantities were subject to restrictions: up to 100 pieces per month on one console, after which purchases are made using the same bank card. Nevertheless, some ordinary users also complained online about the restrictions imposed on them.

There is no direct evidence that Sony is specifically targeting accounts from Russia, but there are indirect signs indicating regional selectivity, said Yaroslav Meshalkin, managing partner of the Heads'made digital communications agency. Russians massively use "workarounds": buying foreign games and subscriptions through foreign accounts, various software tools, and virtual cards, which violates the official rules of the platform. Technically, Sony records such patterns of behavior, and sanctions may look like a "regional sweep," even if formally it is a violation of the rules, he added.

Photo: TASS/Abdullah Firas/ABACA

— In the geopolitical context, when large technology companies from the United States are withdrawing from the Russian market, such measures fit into a broader contour of technological isolation. This is not necessarily a coordinated action, but the effects of political pressure and the sanctions environment are also evident in the digital space. So we can talk not about political blocking, but about the sanctions-commercial "domino effect," he believes.

According to the expert, unblocking accounts that have been "distributed" is unlikely. Sony support refuses in such cases without a detailed explanation, citing a violation of the user agreement. Even if a person creates a new account, it will be automatically disabled if the console is already on the blacklist. The chances of appealing are minimal.

Most accounts have been permanently blocked by the console, which means that any accounts on them will be disabled, and registration of new ones is limited. In other words, consoles have become useless "bricks," said IT expert Sergey Pomortsev.

Why are there blockages?

The domestic market is still not saturated enough with games that could completely replace foreign ones, said Daniil Lopatnikov, Deputy Head of the Digital Sports Development Service at the Federal Sports Reserve Training Center. This causes a number of problems with the purchase of both the games themselves and their add-ons. Nevertheless, gamers in Russia have long learned how to "bypass" locks in a variety of ways.

Photo: IZVESTIA/Sergey Lantyukhov

— Blocking Russians is justified in terms of violating the company's policies and terms of service. People massively fake accounts in order to gain benefits, such as access to games or obtaining regional prices. At the same time, from the point of view of legislation, our gamers do not violate anything if the ban has not been received from the authorities of the Russian Federation. Therefore, outages are mainly possible only by those imposed by the organization itself, in our case, Sony Entertainment and its flagship PlayStation gaming brand," added Daniil Lopatnikov.

He recalled that since 2022, restrictions have been created for the Russian Federation on previously existing PlayStation 4 devices, so it is logical that they also apply to PlayStation 5 and PlayStation Portal users.

— The degree of violation depends on the user agreement. Legally, Sony and other large companies have the right to ban an account for attempting to bypass the locks. However, there are two important factors: first, the company needs to allocate resources that will analyze accounts and record crawls. She needs to spend a lot of money to get less money, and it's not profitable for business," said Svyatoslav Pegov, director of the Center for Sports Programming, Algorithmic Robotics, Cybersecurity and Esports at Ufa University of Science and Technology.

He called reputational risks the second factor. In case of active blocking, the gamer will understand that if the company or the government of the country in whose jurisdiction it is located does not like something, the user will lose all purchased digital goods. Then he'll just go to a company that doesn't do that, the expert concluded.

Photo: Global Look Press/Britta Pedersen

In his opinion, all current restrictions will remain in place, and the May lockdowns are just one of the many stages in the fight against Russian gamers. In addition to this, such bans may in fact increase foreign policy pressure on the Russian Federation, following the restrictions of the European Union, which in the 16th package of sanctions banned the export to Russia of current game consoles from Microsoft (Xbox), Sony (PlayStation) and Nintendo (Switch) from EU countries, as well as related accessories and controllers.

This is not the first scandal with Sony in May, earlier the company added to the PC version of Stellar Blade the need to link a PlayStation Network account, which made the game unavailable on Steam for people from more than 120 countries. Not only gamers were unhappy with this decision, but also the developers themselves from the South Korean studio Shift Up, Sergey Pomortsev recalled.