Topic: PSN = Privacy? Security? Never!

[UncleBob]

I would hate to see most you work in rehab centers. This is like saying that someone who used to be a drug user has no right to tell others not to use drugs.

If you want to equate this to drug rehab, then let's go full force.

True rehabilitation includes apologizing and making reparations to those you harmed while abusing.

Do you have a copy of the apology letter you sent to Sony, along with a copy of the canceled check for all the illegal activities that you partook of while you had your PSP?

Sony never got money from me anyways. I bought my PSP and games used and never planned to buy news ones since used copies were much cheaper, so if anything I would have to apologize to GameStop. Haha. I do regret actions I have taken in the past.

So, since you were never going to buy games from Sony, your hacking actions are okay?

So, if Geo and gang come out and say that they have no plans to buy Sony games, you'll be okay with their hacking, right?

[oohhboy]

I think he is going to plead the fifth.

[Chozo Ghost]

TJ is vehemently against hackers despite being once a PSP hacker himself.

I'm sure he still is. That post wasn't that long ago. But beside that, he's in favor of crippling this guy for the rest of his life with a 1,000,000 Euro fine on his head which will permanently lower his standard of living. Does TJ show him any sympathy or willing to give him a second chance? No. And this guy didn't do anything that TJ didn't do.

Setting aside the issue of what this hacker's crime was, I don't think there would be much point to "giving him a second chance".  The guy is unrepetent, as he has already said that if Sony wants him to stop that they're "going to have to kill [him] because [he] just can't live without hacking."  I'm currently trying to find the destructoid link where I read that.

But I still don't understand what he's doing wrong. Why shouldn he be repentent about trying to use Linux on hardware which he bought and legally owns? If he is pirating games then okay, in that case I would pick up the torch and pitchfork along with you, but there's no evidence of that. The only thing there is evidence of is that he was hacking the hardware in order to install Linux. That isn't a crime, but even if it WERE a crime I don't see anything wrong with that from a moral standpoint. He isn't harming anyone or stealing anything. Your problem is you are confusing hacking with piracy, and while it is true hacking can sometimes lead to piracy it can also lead to other things which are benign like Linux.

If Sony has evidence he is pirating then I would support them in their fight against him. But if all he is doing is benign hacking then I support him and think Sony is just being a bunch of asshole bullies. I'm against piracy as much as you are, but unlike you I make a distinction between piracy and hacking.

[BlackNMild2k1]

You know what this reminds me of? It reminds me of how Rush Limbaugh had been advocating life sentences for drug offenders for years, and then it was discovered Rush Limbaugh was a drug offender himself.

You know what this reminds me of? It reminds me of those public figure heads that actively speak out against Adam on Steve only to be caught a few weeks later at a hotel with a Ru Paul or some other guy in an airport bathroom.

Self Hatred. Don't do it.


edit: I agree with Chozo's post above me.


edit2: censorship?

[broodwars]

Your problem is you are confusing hacking with piracy, and while it is true hacking can sometimes lead to piracy it can also lead to other things which are benign like Linux.

*snip*

I'm against piracy as much as you are, but unlike you I make a distinction between piracy and hacking.

I'm not confusing the hackers with the pirates.  My problem with the pirates is that they are scum who are destroying the industry financially as well as forcing companies to dump incredibly intrusive anti-piracy DRM on legitimate customers.

My problem with the hackers is that they have no perspective: their ends are justified no matter what other ends may emerge from them, because as hackers they are somehow "special", above the petty Rule of Law.  Returning Linux to a relative 5 legitimate users is somehow worth opening the floodgates to a relative 500,000 pirates.  And it's not like the hackers have been particularly subtle about what they were doing: they made sure everyone who might want to use their hacks for whatever means had the knowledge of them.  They very publicly hand the pirates the starting point to begin stealing from Sony just so a couple of users can play around with homebrew.  I just wish the hackers had been a lot quieter with their efforts and not made sure the entire internet (Good and Bad alike) knew how to destroy Sony's security measures.  If they had been, I'd be a lot more sympathetic to them because I really don't have a problem with people running Linux on their PS3s.  I don't mind them hacking their games to allow alternative input devices and whatnot.  What I mind is that the information wasn't released in a manner that limited the collateral damage and prevented Sony from going after everyone with a PS3.

That isn't to say that Sony is totally blameless, but there had to be a better way to handle this on both sides of the issue.

[BranDonk Kong]

You do realize that PS3 hacking and piracy was going on for a good 6 months before Sony decided to start suing people (who had nothing to do with piracy), and it's because of SONY that this has been getting mainstream attention, right? George Hotz wasn't interviewed by G4TV and CNBC back when he was minding his own little website and putting a single video on YouTube. graf_chokolo wasn't even mentioned in any of this until Sony sued him.

[broodwars]

You do realize that PS3 hacking and piracy was going on for a good 6 months before Sony decided to start suing people (who had nothing to do with piracy), and it's because of SONY that this has been getting mainstream attention, right? George Hotz wasn't interviewed by G4TV and CNBC back when he was minding his own little website and putting a single video on YouTube. graf_chokolo wasn't even mentioned in any of this until Sony sued him.

If I remember correctly, this whole thing started when Hotz's little fanclub decided to post detailed instructions on how to bypass the PS3's security measures at some computer hacking conference, which then hit the internet and started this dance.  At least, that's the first I heard of it, back on the now-closed Sony thread.

It just strikes me how despite Nintendo having widespread homebrew hacking, I didn't really know it was going on until a couple of years ago and it didn't really become a thing I was aware of until the Fatal Frame 4/Donkey Kong Country Returns homebrew hacks were released.  I think those hackers did a much better job of keeping their operations quiet, and Nintendo has largely left them alone probably as a result (of course, Nintendo practically being able to print money this generation certainly helps).  I don't think these companies altogether care about Homebrew.  Homebrew is only ever used by a relative handful of people to do fairly minor things.  The big threat is piracy and online cheaters, which is what has happened on the PS3.  I don't think Sony would have altogether cared about Hotz's hacking efforts or Other OS in general if piracy wasn't looking to be a legitimate threat from it.  After all, why kick the hackers' nest unless you absolutely have to?

[BlackNMild2k1]

Now that we have inflated the post count in this thread by 200+ post in a matter of 5 day based on the info from one post that has steered it's self everywhere around but almost never on the topic at hand, now it's time to maybe get back on topic (the last 3 post that happened since I started this post are already back on topic). Anyway, here is what Graf Chokolo is being sued about (from the info Brandogg sent me)

http://ps3crunch.com/grafchokolo-received-sony-threats-rubbished.html

I was sued by the state (Germany) for spreading copyrighted SONY’s and PS3′s stuff (criminal procedure) and by SONY
for example for Sonic and games i asked from others to upload and other things (civil pocedure). So, sued twice. Police comfiscated my PC and all my PS3s

There is nothing in there about blackmail or pirating, so lets go ahead and drop that line of discourse now, and I'm not even so sure the "spreading of copyrighted information" even has to do with him hacking the HyperVisor specifically, but more making the knowledge on how to do it very publicly available which has unfortunately led to widespread piracy on a now wide open system.


Am I in the ballpark now?

[TJ Spyke]

Since he admits that he spread the info and admits that it is illegal, can anyone actually defend him? I was off on the blackmail part, but he still broke German law (according to the German government, at least).

As brood said, companies in general don't really mind homebrewers that much (although they do get annoyed every time Nintendo updates the Wii OS since they have to come up with a new workaround). It's when they start making it possible to pirate games and spreading the info that they get upset.

[UncleBob]

Where does he admit he spread illegal information?

[TJ Spyke]

He doesn't say that. He did admit to spreading the info and that (at least according to the German government) it is illegal to do that.

[UncleBob]

According to who's interpretation of German Law?

[broodwars]

Where does he admit he spread illegal information?

Indeed, he does only admit to allegedly spreading copywritten information and "PS3 stuff".  The line that really bugs me is this one:

for example for Sonic and games i asked from others to upload and other things (civil pocedure)

I'm not up on my hacker lingo so I'm not sure what he means by this, but did he just admit to committing software piracy or asking others to pirate games for him?   

[TJ Spyke]

According to who's interpretation of German Law?

The German government, which he says in that post is suing him for doing it (see BNM's post).

brood, that is what it sounds like to me.

[UncleBob]

I'd say he admits to spreading allegedly copyrighted information.  Think of it this way.

He posts on some random forums "Hey, here's secret SONY code: RND=4".  Then, SONY comes in and sues, saying, "Hey!  RND=4 is ours!".  That doesn't mean it is theirs, just that they're claiming it's copyrighted.  Nothing more, nothing less.

[TJ Spyke]

He's not saying it isn't copyrighted, he doesn't even deny doing it. He just says he was sued for doing it.

[UncleBob]

He's not saying it isn't copyrighted, he doesn't even deny doing it. He just says he was sued for doing it.

...and?
Just because someone doesn't say "I didn't do it" doesn't make them guilty.

[TJ Spyke]

But he admitted to doing it.

[UncleBob]

But he admitted to doing it.

He admitted to releasing the information.  I'm sure he doesn't think it's subject to copyright law.

[BranDonk Kong]

The whole Wii hacking scene has been so underground BECAUSE NINTENDO DOESN'T SUE HACKERS. The Wii hacking scene is MUCH larger than the PS3 hacking scene, especially when it comes to piracy (after all, the Wii was hacked to play backups within a matter of weeks of it's launch) - but Nintendo has never made it a huge media and (il)legal ordeal like Sony has done - that's the difference. Over 1 million people (actually it's probably not that many, since many people have been banned multiple times) have been banned from Xbox Live for having modded consoles, yet you don't see Microsoft tracking down and suing c4eva for releasing the firmware that allows you to do so. Sony 100% brought the attention upon themselves - the whole hacker's conference with "Hotz' little fanclub" has been going on for years, and the people you are talking about (who are in no way affiliated with George Hotz) are the same people that hacked the Wii, and they first demonstrated it...at the same conference, several years ago - but it took until your FF4 and DKCR experience to take notice.

What graf did is have people send him eboots from retail and PSN games, in order for him to decrypt them and release tools for others to do the same (among other things). If he was a pirate, surely he would just download them or copy them from a disc himself.

PLEASE actually TRY to find out some REAL information about the subject - don't just wait for myself and others to spoon-feed you everything so you can immediately make assumptions and just argue against our opinions (and the facts).

[broodwars]

PLEASE actually TRY to find out some REAL information about the subject - don't just wait for myself and others to spoon-feed you everything so you can immediately make assumptions and just argue against our opinions (and the facts).

*comment withdrawn by user.*

[BranDonk Kong]

I wasn't talking to you.

[broodwars]

I wasn't talking to you.

Alright, comment withdrawn.  Sorry about that.  It just seemed to respond to my asking that question.

[BranDonk Kong]

Well to be honest I was talking "at" different people at different times, but I try not to place names and keep it more generalized without attacking any single person.

[Chozo Ghost]

But he admitted to doing it.

He admitted to releasing the information.  I'm sure he doesn't think it's subject to copyright law.

Exactly. He fully admits that he was hacking; but he denies having committed any sort of crime. Hacking is not a crime in and of itself, so while he was hacking and fully admits to said hacking, where's the proof of criminal activity?