Shortly after the US launch of the Wii, hackers found that the Wii Shop channel was powered by a limited version of the Opera web browser. With a little technical knowledge and creativity, it was possible to redirect the Wii Shop to browse different websites, albeit in a somewhat limited manner. News of this feat spread across several Internet news sites, and Nintendo took notice.

Upon entering Wii Shop today, Wii owners were prompted to download and install a firmware update. It turns out that this update, required to continue using Wii Shop, changes the way that the Wii Shop browser works. The change forces the browser to use an encrypted web connection at all times, thus eliminating the previous redirection oversight. Wii owners will now have to wait until the official Opera web browser is released in order to browse the web on their systems.