Last week on the 8th June, I shared what I saw as a really good offer from /shopto.com (12 month PlayStation membership for £29 that was ending that evening). I ended up sharing the offer on my PSN feed. It’s the first time I’ve shared anything externally on my feed other than game snaps, videos and trophy hunting related things etc.

That evening I received my first warning Notification from Sony stating a that I had sent “malicious urls”  to other users. I obviously thought that I didn’t know I wasn’t allowed to do that as I genuinely was not aware and had seen simular shares from some of my PSN friends. I’ll mention that the link I shared was just a direct website link and of no affiliation to me or any other, it wasn’t malicious in any way or to profit).

The day after I Purchased the entire MotoGP and Dead Rising series from the PSStore and then I then received a “Permanent Banned” email/notification.

I guessed that someone or a few had reported me due to the whole “malicious url” notification I received the following day but thought a Permanent Ban is a bit OTT.

I have had my account for over 10 years, and would call myself a Playstation Dedicated Trophy Hunter when it comes to gaming, I’ve even raised money for charity with a 24 hour continuous gaming session. I share guides and videos to the Trophy Hunting community. I now see that the web url I shared relating to an offer I thought my friends and trophy hunting community would of appreciated was my bad but it was a genuine mistake. I also share on my channel to my followers. The url I shared wasn’t malicious or a threatening link etc it was a picture of the offer and a direct share of their website). I can see that promoting any offers falls under Playstations code of conduct “Not to send offers to others “ I realised this when got the first notification as a warning.

I’ve spoke to Sony support who was extremely helpful and listened to what had happened. The lady on the phone thought it sounded bizzare and said she contact the moderator team who will get in touch within 48 hours.

24 hours later I was told by email that my permanent “suspension would remain and that I had previous offences relating to malicious urls.

on Another call to them today 16th June and after a lot of emails back and forth. I was told I had no previous offences and my ban was due to malicious urls and sending out offers to others of a commercial activity. 

It’s the first time I’ve actually shared a link/url on my feed in all the years I’ve used my account.  It’s only recently I’ve shared gameplay/game images and trophy related things as I’ve built up a following and started to enjoy getting feedback and comments from similar players and trophy hunters.

To permanently loose my account “Permanently Banned” makes me feel absolutely sick, it’s worse than loosing a console due to it dying. At least things could be recovered from a failed console. My account is not only a gaming account to me in any spare time but it’s a huge part of my life and has been since my first PS3.

>My trophies (lvl 36/37) and the amount of time I’ve put in to achieve that.

>My digital/PSStore 309 ps4 and 100s of ps3 games that I have purchased and collected.

>My sharefactory videos I have edited ready to upload to my gaming channel.

>My back ups and saves.

A Permanent Ban for sharing a link is like a life sentence for a mistake. I not only loose my life I loose £1000s of games that I’ve invested in, years and years of chasing platinum trophies and 100% on games.

By all means I do understand my bad and lesson was learned after the warning notification but I really think I don’t deserve the hefty life sentence. It seems really extreme of Sony to do this and I recently keep seeing thatSony have banned others too. 

I’ve also no knowledge of any previous offences/warnings. I’ve even looked back through my emails and I’ve had nothing from Sony/PlayStation. Also when looking into Bans & suspensions it does say several warnings before given a Permanent Ban (depending on the offence) and I had a warning then by the following day a Straight up lifetime Ban. Surely you can see that this doesn’t make sense?

I’m atm back and forth with Sony Support via email but I feel I’m not getting anywhere or anything relating to this previous offence(s) that I’ve requested. I really need this looking into by someone that actually cares for its gamers and how important the PSN is to us.

I really hope someone within Sony sees this and has some empathy for my situation.