8 more women workers at Sony accuse PlayStation maker of sexism

Eight more women employees at Sony Interactive Entertainment have accused the PlayStation maker of sexism at workplace, according to court documents.

A former IT security analyst, Emma Majo, at PlayStation in November last year had sought the court's approval to "expand her effort into a class action on behalf of women who've worked for PlayStation in the past few years".

Axios reported late on Wednesday that eight former and current employees have now added their accounts of sexist treatment to the proposed class-action lawsuit against the gaming giant.

"Majo's lawyer has filed statements of support from seven former PlayStation workers and one current employee. These women provided written statements of support detailing instances of sexism at the company and across multiple offices in the United States," the report noted.

She alleged gender discrimination and wrongful termination after speaking up "about discrimination against females" at the company.

Sony did not comment on the new statements, but it had denied Majo's claims last month.

Majo "fails to identify a single policy, practice or procedure at [PlayStation] that allegedly formed the basis of any widespread intentional discrimination or had a discriminatory impact on women," Sony's lawyers had said.

In the new statements, the eight women described a range of behaviours across multiple PlayStation offices, "including demeaning comments, unwelcome advances, a lack of attention paid to their work or ideas and, most frequently, a sense that it was harder for women to be promoted in the company".

Majo had alleged that other women at PlayStation struggled to get promoted at the same rate as men.

The Sony lawsuit came amid high-profile state and federal lawsuits against "Call of Duty" maker Activision over alleged sexual misconduct and gender-based pay disparities.

In 2018, women from Los Angeles-based Riot Games had filed a class-action suit alleging gender discrimination.