Sony has launched a bug bounty program to reward those who discover and report security vulnerabilities affecting the PlayStation 4 and PlayStation Network.

The Japanese tech giant has partnered with bug bounty platform HackerOne to administer the program, which offers various levels of cash rewards for "critical" PS4 flaws, starting at up to $50,000.

The news was confirmed by Sony's Geoff Norton, who wrote on his blog: "At PlayStation, we are committed to providing a great experience for gamers everywhere.

"Today we are pleased to announce the launch of the PlayStation Bug Bounty program. We believe that by working together with the security research community, we can provide a safer playground."

Norton said the program is "open to the security research community, gamers, and anyone else interested in testing the security of PlayStation 4 and PlayStation Network."

According to Sony, the plan focuses primarily on vulnerabilities affecting the PlayStation 4 hardware, operating system, accessories, and PlayStation Network.

"For PlayStation 4 systems, accessories, and operating systems, we will accept submissions regarding currently released system software or beta versions," Sony explained on its HackerOne page.

For the PlayStation Network, Sony specifically asks for reports of security issues related to the following domains:

While this program is intended for PlayStation 4 defects, Sony will also consider reports not covered.

and states: "PlayStation may accept reports regarding previous versions of system software on a case-by-case basis at its discretion."

Sony also states.

Regarding compensation, Sony stated that the amount depends on the "severity of the vulnerability" and the "quality of the report." It also states that only vulnerabilities that have "never been reported in the past" will be considered.

Reward amounts are categorized by critical, high, medium, and low vulnerabilities, with researchers able to claim rewards starting at $3,000 for PlayStation Network critical vulnerabilities and $50,000 for PlayStation 4 critical vulnerabilities.

To alert Sony to PS4 security vulnerabilities and be eligible for a reward, researchers are required to create an account on HackerOne and submit a report via the platform.

In April 2011, the PlayStation Network was hacked by an as yet unknown intruder, taking away the account records of 77 million users. Sony shut down the network for more than three weeks while it cleaned up the situation.