Attention: Dead Pixel on Sony F717 Sensor

Hi everyone.
Here is something that happened to me and I want to share it with you.
I have got a Sony Cyber-shot F717 digital camera and I have been using it for about a year now. Recently I spoted a dead pixel on all the photos taken with my f717, especially on darker ones. In fact it is a "always red" pixel or however they call it. I have provided a picture here of it. You can see it magnified in upper corner of pic. It is not so obvious as you can see, but a friend of mine told me that those pixels tend to expand during the time. I don't remember pointing my camera into sun or other strong source of light. So here is somethig you shoul have in mind when buying a digital camera. I'd appreciate if anyone else had same problem and what to do in such a situation. I'll contact my seller and see if guarantee will cover this. :(
http://img76.echo.cx/img76/4193/deadpixel6ev.th.jpg (http://img76.echo.cx/my.php?image=deadpixel6ev.jpg)

Are you sure your sensor just doesn't need cleaning?

Dirty sensor would look blotchy, not like a pixel. Unfortunatley, pixels on sensors, like pixels on an LCD screen, do indeed go dead and are normally not covered by warranty unless a certain percentage of them are dead (manufacturer dependent)

Any way to prevent this? I know a sensor replacement isn't very cheap.

No, i don't thik it is due to cleaning, because it is not a SLR camera. The lens is hermetically closed i suppose.