Yes, customers want the company to acknowledge that an incident occurred, or is still occurring. And, yes, customers want the company to be as open as possible about what caused the incident, how the incident is being resolved, and what is being done to prevent similar incidents in the future. But, the most important part of incident response from a customer service perspective is to take responsibility and apologize.

In Sony's defense, , and it seems to be providing more details about the incident. It is understandably difficult for a company to be forthcoming with information while it is still trying to understand what happened itself. But, the apology should come sooner--like first.

Don't try to pretend the problem doesn't exist. Don't try to play the victim card--like it just happened to you and there was nothing that could be done--even if that is true. Put a little more 'mea culpa' in your response. As the company entrusted with sensitive information, or relied upon to deliver a service, you have a responsibility to guard that information or provide that service, and at the very least when you fail to do so you must take responsibility and tell customers you're sorry.