A magistrate has decided Sony can subpoena PayPal to access George Hotz's, aka GeoHot, PayPal records. Sony claims Hotz received money for the hack from people in Northern California, a claim Hotz denies. Sony is currently suing GeoHot for posting a video explaining how to hack the PS3. He was however, not the one who discovered the exploit, nor was he the one to make the first custom firmware.
NEWS: Sony Files A Lawsuit Against PS3 Hackers, One Hacker Appears In Court To Address Claims
Two weeks ago Sony was granted access to the IP addresses of everyone who went to GeoHot's website since January 2009. In the weeks prior to that Sony also gained access to information about GeoHot from YouTube, Google, and Twitter. GeoHot is accused of breaking the Digital Millennium Copyright Act by posting the encryption key for the PS3 hack on his website.
Every time Sony gains access to more information, I ask you, "Do you think their actions are fair?" I can't help but feel like Sony is going about this the wrong way, am I totally off-base in thinking they are trying to make an example out of him?
Source: Wired
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CheezyWeezle
This is funny. No it really is. It wasn't Geohot who hacked PSN. He was a part, yes, but not the mastermind. No, they won't ever find the mastermind. It also wasn't Anonymous, who took credit for hacking PSN various times. The mastermind is totally unaffiliated. Or so I am told... Anyways, Geohot also wasn't the first to post code of Sony's on the web. It has been posted a million times before, there has even been complete Custom Firmware that you can put on a PS3 via USB, with tutorials. He did hack, and he also was a part in the major hacking responsible for downing PSN, but he was only a part of it. They got the wrong guy...
Cloak009r
to try to put a sculptor and a hacker on the same level is ridiculous. Hacking is against every company's ToS/EULA/etc. True, when you buy something it should be yours, but when you change something to operate out of it's original intended use, you are taking a risk. GeoHot isn't stupid, some even claim he's a genius...So why didn't he read the ToS? I'm not against people hacking, I used to do it back in the counter strike days(1.0+). I knew if I got caught I would be banned from the server...Now the fact that Geo posted a video with info on how to crack the ps3 os(and worse?)...Common sense tells you there will be consequences... Do I believe sony is going to far? try to put yourself in the shoes of a business man with a great product...Some random decides to tell the world how to circumvents your securities and puts all your customers information at risk. Do you think making an example of him is right? Do you think it would make the next person think twice before trying the same thing? All throughout history rulers/ court systems have done the same thing....was it right then? Sometimes yes, other times no. I think sony has the right to take him to court. I believe he shouldn't have done that, but at the same time, it's forces Sony to beef up their securities. Hopefully the person(s) who forced sony to shut down the PSN will not do anything with the information they retrieved(if they did actually retrieve anything).... and instead did that as a show of how weak the securities really were + to show Geo we all don't think he was completely wrong in everything he did. I don't believe he's 100% wrong in what he did...my main disagreement is how he went public with the information. Not all hackers are bad, and I believe he had good intentions when posting the video. Good luck Geo, I hope you get a light sentence if any...
BraxtonFTW
Odd, I just bought a PS3 today... Oh well.
Sony, you're a douche.
GeoHot, I really wanted to play Black-Ops today...
Fail.
ryan11444
Most of you are dumb. You talk about the crap like you know what your talking about.
The facts are tampering with a system is illegal, that being a ps3, xbox360, etc... And they state it everywhere! On your system, in thier user agreements, and so on.
Now from my opinion, about 98% of the time they dont care but mostly its just mods to make your offline play like career, and single player games more fun to you. But they take action and make a great big deal when people tamper with thier systems to where it will effect other Ps3 owners.
For example, a hacker puts out a hack that will make them better online and or hack other peoples account. When Sony finds that hacker, they will mistreat them. Its common sense. If you dont want your rights to be twisted so much that you technically have no rights, dont be a retard and do illegal stuff. Xbox360 has alot more hackers then ps3 (Until this public release crap), and the reason for this is when Xbox finds out they just ban thier account.
Ok heres that hackers reaction "That sucks! Oh well ill just make a new account, and continue hacking". And if they ban it to where the whole system cant be used on Live, then its "Oh well ill just buy a new one from Craigslist". But Sony doesnt let them slip that easily. They shouldnt go as far as they are going now, but they shouldnt get off to easy either.
Its like the drug dealer who gets arrested, and when the cops find crack in his pockets he says stuff like "I found that on the ground" or "That aint mine", well you were caught red handed.
Think about it, if the ps3 gets filled with hackers (Most being little kids and or teenagers with no life) people will eventually stop playing. Meaning Sony eventually starts losing members/players. That means they are losing buisiness, that means they are losing money, which means they would start to dissapear. Its a whole diffrent story when its for personal uses that doesnt affect other psn users.
I hate hackers. But the way i see it if your going to hack, either
A. Use it for good, and not waste your talents
Or
B. Dont tamper with online things that will affect hundereds of people
If your going to do it anyways, at least dont release it to the public. Just stop and think, there are going to be every little kid who thinks hacking systems makes them, and just other lowlifes who like to make people mad by using that method. If your going to hack keep it for yourself dont give 10,000 other lowlifes the power to do it as well.
And to the hackers messing with Psn. JUST GIVE IT A REST! No matter how much you hack, no matter how many times you think your proving a point, your actually doing nothing but making it look even worst for him. Think about it,
GeoHot: I dont think its that big of a deal your honor, i didnt mean for it to mess up psn in any way.
Judge: Really? At first i felt Sony was taking it to far, but then again your hacking buddies are crashing Sony websites, and pulling all this other illegal hacking bs left and right while you are sitting in here claiming you guys dont mean to do it?
I mean come on, common sense people. Hacking got him into this mess, so why would you use hacking to try to get him out of it? Most likely its just going to get you dragged into it.
Thunderheist77
As a many as fallacies as you guys can lay, lets remember this concept with dealing with any authoritarian
Freedom vs Order vs Equality.
Now to use the Linux OS you are agreeing that Sony in no way will help you nor give you updates because you compromise two things: Order and Equality
Linux option was put out initially for the purpose off increased freedom, or programming, (inhibit creativity from gamer communities specifically) and also as another selling point for other consumers in mind, like the military because of the its microcell processing capability
But hackers took advantage of this way too far. Sony reacted accordingly because of jail broken psp's (courtesy of hackers), modded hackers playing online against eula abiding users (courtesy of hackers) and feared that eventually the ps3 network would be compromised courtesy of hackers.
At that point Equality was being compromised because hackers were able to further themselves. Numerous examples are seen throughout numerous online games on the ps3 where hackers cheat their way through games via mods.
With such inequality Order was then established with ps3 removing the linux option via update so users could not program any mod or malicious software that could compromise even balance gaming.
They built this machine with online gaming community in mind, so at one point freedom must be constricted to maintain order and equality just how Sony took the option out because things we're getting out of control. Its because of Sony's policing that hackers feel like their freedoms have been restricted.
REALIZE YOU DO HAVE THE RIGHT TO US THE LINUX OS BUT IF YOU USE YOU CANNOT PARTICIPATE IN SONY'S NETWORK. So therefore, downgrade your system and play around. Agreeing to the EULA means your agreeing to the standard format of conduct that playstation users must abide to play online and that since PSN is moderated by Sony, they may change it as they see fit. Has the Ps3's purpose been compromised? No, they just want users, who choose to opt for the Linux software, to agree that sony does not endorse that in any way because its outside of their network and they cannot control it and shouldn't take responsibility because it is an open-source .
They also stated in the their disclaimers throughout each update they can change the rules to prevent piracy and cheating as they see fit by agreeing to that you are agreeing in that youre compromising the linux option but in that sony will let you conduct yourself amongst their domain. If you linux users are mad for not being with SCE's domain, make one yourself... it wasn't even advertised in the first place, Linux enthusiast were the ones who put it there out.
This whole lawsuit is completely ignorant. Inform yourselves people.
jheechify
I for one am a Software Engineer and if you don't create something you have no right to change it, period. I personally think that the "dumbass" hacker should have the book thrown at him and he deserves it. It doesn't matter if he didn't create the hack, he helped spread it so he's just as guilty. Yes this is a free country, but not free to steal from others. He's lucky I'm not on his jury if he has one, because I would honestly enjoy putting him behind bars.
DrRohin
I personally think that if you buy something you should own it. Having access to the information on it is a grey area. However if you do find some way to get access to it and share it with ours does not give the company any right to attack you. Now taking away access to the service is complete with in their rights. How would you all feel if you found away to make you home computer more fun and shared it with others and the company that made the computer did the same thing to you that sony is doing to GEOHOT...... sorry to say but that is the end game people.... if you own something you should be able to actually own it... its not a lease its ownership....
dashizzel
GeoHot committed a crime. He took intellectual property dealing with Sony's security and made it public. Not only did he openly share Sony's root code he admitted to helping in hack the system so that he and others can run programs on software Sony wrote with out Sony's permission. IF you buy a book yes you can do what ever you want with it, burn it or read it, but you can not take the words and distribute them as if they were yours, because someone else thought of them and made them their property.
Another thing, the internet is a public domain. If someone commits a crime in a 7-11 the police and eventually prosecutors can get just about any information or "evidence" that they need including security footage (which would show everyone who had entered the store) credit card information (to match names with faces of anyone who may have committed the crime) and witness statements(that might be you if you were in the store). This is exactly what Sony is doing right now except electronically. there searching public sites for traffic information (who's been there) PayPal for credit information and his computers because that's what he used to commit the accused crime.Just because its the internet it does not mean there is no personal responsibility
redran2
its sony they want to control everything
linkfan57
I agree with most people in saying that GeoHot did something illegal and Sony has the right to sue him....It makes me sad that this is wrong, but I guess I can't pretend that we only have righteous nobles hacking the system. I think that Sony's lawyers are very smooth talking if they can talk the courts into allowing them access to private information. I know that we probably don't have much to worry about in this particular case, BUT this may become a huge security risk down the road.
Let's just hope that this doesn't set the precedent for things to come...
Xero_Wing
...and in further news the members of geohots client list are suing paypal over violation of there own privacy policy
kamakazii09
I don't see why Sony went this far as to sue geo for doing this. When they saw the video on youtube of the PS3 security code, they should have gotten mad at their software developers for making their security such an easy thing to hack. I'm sure they did, but to go as far as to suing one person (who wasn't the first person to even hack the ps3) because of it. I, myself downloaded geohotz hack from HIS website. actually wait, its not a hack it was a jailbreak for the ps3 3.55 firmware, and it even said during setup that he does not condone to piracy. it's ridiculous. sony is going wayy too far with this. I hope sony loses. Hacking should be appreciated since it shows the big companies (i.e Sony, Microsoft) that their products aren't full proof and they should take some more time in making them more secure so the hackers can't hack them and not worry about getting a system out on the market to make money.
Ekaj2113
He spent his money on a PS3 then he hacked it because he could. That's what he does. That's like a sculptor buying clay and then him getting sued because he made a statue! Nobody get's upset when Ben Heck makes a kick-ass handheld of an old console. If you're mad about people getting unfair advantages in online games, leave the match and report their gamertag. Everyone who's complaining sounds like a spoiled little punk who doesn't even know how to install RAM let alone find a way to bypass the security system on a next-gen console. This man is a genius, and instead of supporting him for giving people the opportunity to do something most of you would never do, you sit behind your computers and judge him for expressing himself. And you call yourselves gamers.
Ekaj2113
He spent his money on a PS3 then he hacked it because he could. That's what he does. That's like a sculptor buying clay and then him getting sued because he made a statue! Nobody get's upset when Ben Heck makes a kick-ass handheld of an old console. If you're mad about people getting unfair advantages in online games, leave the match and report their gamertag. Everyone who's complaining sounds like a spoiled little punk who doesn't even know how to install RAM let alone find a way to bypass the security system on a next-gen console. This man is a genius, and instead of supporting him for giving people the opportunity to do something most of you would never do, you sit behind your computers and judge him for expressing himself. And you call yourselves gamers.
darkstein
I hope Sony bans every IP address on that list from the Playstation Network. Then we can all play xbox.
Cause that is what will happen. . .
PS: Microsoft has publicly stated that they want hackers to test the limintations of the Kinect.
Sally Wong
The moment you commit any crime, you instantly just forfeited all your rights, and you now must be prepared to do the time !
Love and Kisses: Sally Wong :
vole182
I think you have forgotten that SONY broke the law by removing features first.
According to Sony you have the choice of either:
- update PS3 and lose otherOS (a paid for feature), but the have ability to play PSN
or
- keep otherOS and lose any future compatibily with new games and lose PSN (an advertised feature, despite it being free) (and also paid for store games)
yeah that seems fair... Sony is great!
Either you lose paid-for features or you lose advertised features.
vole182
I think you have forgotten that SONY broke the law by removing features first.
According to Sony you have the choice of either:
- update PS3 and lose otherOS (a paid for feature), but the have ability to play PSN
or
- keep otherOS and lose any future compatibily with new games and lose PSN (an advertised feature, despite it being free) (and also paid for store games)
yeah that seems fair... Sony is great!
Either you lose paid-for features or you lose advertised features.
kjlo5
WOW I cant believe everybody thinks that this guy is wrong because he published how to hack the PS3. Everybody seems to think it is OK to hack the thing but not to cheat on games one the PSN or ruin anybody else's fun. This is a ridiculous argument. If you are OK with hacking the PS3 you are OK with circumventing copyright law. You can justify it all you want but the act of doing so is illegal.
To call something more Illegal than something else that is Illegal is stupid. It's like saying I'm fine with you steeling food for your family if they are starving but if you do it because you are greedy then it is not OK. What is Illegal is illegal and that is it.
I like the fact that this guy put out the info on how to hack the ps3 because of what happened with the original Xbox and XBMC. lots of cool innovation came out of that even though it was illegal.
Programs are not Illegal. the act of circumventing copyright protection is. either you are fine with that or you are not. Just don't try to justify it because you are wrong.
kjlo5
WOW I cant believe everybody thinks that this guy is wrong because he published how to hack the PS3. Everybody seems to think it is OK to hack the thing but not to cheat on games one the PSN or ruin anybody else's fun. This is a ridiculous argument. If you are OK with hacking the PS3 you are OK with circumventing copyright law. You can justify it all you want but the act of doing so is illegal.
To call something more Illegal than something else that is Illegal is stupid. It's like saying I'm fine with you steeling food for your family if they are starving but if you do it because you are greedy then it is not OK. What is Illegal is illegal and that is it.
I like the fact that this guy put out the info on how to hack the ps3 because of what happened with the original Xbox and XBMC. lots of cool innovation came out of that even though it was illegal.
Programs are not Illegal. the act of circumventing copyright protection is. either you are fine with that or you are not. Just don't try to justify it because you are wrong.
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