Sony Has Lost the PS3 Hacking War 322
YokimaSun writes "Sony may have dealt a major blow to the PSjailbreak sellers, but the release last week of PSGroove, an open source version of the hack, has now opened the floodgates of ports to mobile phones such as the Nokia N900 and Palm Pre. The final kick in the teeth is that a port of the exploit has been released by Waninkoko of Wii custom firmware fame for the Dingoo Handheld, which is a homebrew console that is very popular amongst emulation fans. It makes you smile that you can use one homebrew console to hack another to get homebrew on that console. Awesome."
pudge notes that you can apparently do the same with a TI-84 Plus graphing calculator (YouTube video).
Re:Banned from PSN... (Score:1, Insightful)
It makes you smile that you can use one homebrew console to hack another to get homebrew on that console. Awesome.
First of all, this is just used for pirating purposes. In fact that's the only thing the hack allows, so drop the homebrew bullshit.
Secondly, Sony has lost the PS3 hacking war? These hacks are fully detectable by PS3 and Sony. Those who have used them have already been banned from PSN and multiplayer games. What a great way to ruin your expensive console.
u just don't "get it"
Ridiculous submission (Score:5, Insightful)
The hack exploits a bug in the USB code on the PS3. A firmware update will render every single one those hack versions useless.
That's nowhere near a victory of any kind.
It does make homebrew *possible*. (Score:5, Insightful)
You're making a whole lot of assumptions. Following the news of this exploit, there's been no evidence of reaction from Sony beyond the lawyer attacks on distributors. It's true the commercial product is designed for backups (which may be used for piracy, but aren't necessarily), but it does allow adding other code - including homebrew. There simply isn't any around yet. I've been looking into the code injected to see if I can figure out a way to replace it with a Linux bootloader, and so far, this looks doable (but far from easy).
So, 1) this is not *just* used for pirating. 2) that is not all it allows. 3) you're the first I've seen spouting the rumour of people being banned from PSN for this. 4) Sony went right ahead and "ruined" the console months ago.
Sony have taken a surprisingly long time to react on the firmware side of things - they were quicker than this to kill Other OS when they weren't even threatened and knew the attack would have no positive effect.
I have been effectively banned for much less reason, however - insisting on keeping functionality I bought the machine for. SCE started the attack on me back in April, and I'm trying to regain what they've unrightfully removed.
If SCE had any interest in goodwill, they could release an update that reenables Other OS. Contrary to some spurious claims, the function required no extra work on their part - they only made changes to it to prevent Linux from getting "too good" at graphics, which is frankly laughable. It also didn't need removal to fit newer features, as it only existed on models with larger flash in the first place. If Other OS continued working as it should, I'd have no reason to spend so much effort on these exploits.
That seems a bit hyperbolic, no? (Score:5, Insightful)
Equally unsurprisingly, halting the distribution of some OSS software is going about as well as the fight against DVD Jon's little toy did. It's totally unwinnable, and Sony hasn't shown many clear signs of even trying. Shocking.
However, it isn't clear how much this matters. This isn't CSS, where the system was set in stone, millions of un-patchable, non-internet-connected hardware units were already in the wild, and team DRM pretty much just had to suck it up. Those were the good old days.
Sony controls the Playstation Network, and can enforce minimum software versions for access, or punitively lock out units. Even for offline users, individual game disks can mandate, and include, upgrades to a higher version. Sony has, certainly, lost the game against anyone content to just pick up an old PS3 fat on ebay and enjoy a pirated copy of every PS3 game to date, all for ~$200. You'll have to stay offline, and avoid games with mandatory upgrades; but not a bad deal on the whole, I can certainly see a fair few takers.
However, unless this USB hack is seriously powerful, exploiting some basically unblockable fundamental flaw in the PS3's design, all PS3s that ship more than a few weeks from now, are updated(manually or automatically) to the next firmware revision, or wish to play newer games or use newer peripherals, or play online, are back in Sony's camp. And, unlike a DVD or Blu-ray disk, where the plaintext copy, once created, is eminently playable on all sorts of 3rd party devices, general purpose computers, and whatnot, PS3 games are pretty much only playable on PS3s, pending substantial advances in computing power that will allow emulation. This isn't "hack once, run anywhere." Each individual PS3 is controlled separately, and the success of the hacking device depends on how many hackable PS3s remain in the wild, a variable over which Sony has substantial control...
Just reward (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Speaking as somone... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:It does make homebrew *possible*. (Score:5, Insightful)
If this was the iPhone people would call this Jailbreaking and be claiming it is just allowing them to choose what software is on the device.
I don't understand why it's fine on the iPhone yet on a games console it is deemed to be a bit more 'dodgy'. Especially when jailbreaking an iPhone also allows pirate software to be installed.
Re:Banned from PSN... (Score:4, Insightful)
Those who have used them have already been banned from PSN and multiplayer games. What a great way to ruin your expensive console.
Not everybody's idea of an enjoyable gaming experience involves trading insults with hormonal 15 year-olds, nor does $300 meet everyone's definition of "expensive." Jailbreaking is appropriate for anyone who either doesn't care about online features, can afford two consoles, or both. I suspect that's a not-insignificant portion of current and potential owners.
Re:Palm Pre (Score:1, Insightful)
Yeah, you expect me to believe that somebody actually OWNS a Palm Pre?
Sony won the war (Score:3, Insightful)
Sony won because they managed to delay for nearly 4 years the break in the PS3 security, They are not losing money on the console right now, If this would happened early Sony could have lost a lot of money, losing possible game sales on people that probably never had the intention of buying a PS3 because it was not pirate ready is not significant in my opinion, pirates never intended to pay
Re:Banned from PSN... (Score:5, Insightful)
Pardon? I have no interest in either pirating OR homebrew. I just want to load the games that I bought onto the console to improve load times, avoid disc damage from handling, and keep all my games available at all times. What's the point of a 250GB drive it all I have on it are dinky PSN games?
Re:Banned from PSN... (Score:3, Insightful)
Linux on ps3? Give me a break (Score:1, Insightful)
I'm a full time linux user and I also own a ps3 for two years now. However, I never tried to install linux on it because it does it's job well for what I can't do on my linux system - play games. I wouldn't be surprised if most slashdotters that posted so far don't even use linux on their desktop let alone own a ps3. So what's up with the hate?
Re:Banned from PSN... (Score:3, Insightful)
> The "OtherOS" was never more than a very small part of the PS3 story - and it is the Move controller that is making headlines now.
Which has what to do with his point?
Re:It does make homebrew *possible*. (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't understand why it's fine on the iPhone yet on a games console it is deemed to be a bit more 'dodgy'. Especially when jailbreaking an iPhone also allows pirate software to be installed.
Because there's tons of free and useful software for the iPhone. While there may be some for the PS3, it's definitely not a multi-purpose device.
Re:Naturally, the usual OMGWTFPIRACY folks arrive. (Score:3, Insightful)
Exactly. I've been following this mod for exactly one reason: enabling PS2 games on PS3 versions which don't support that. Although having OtherOS to play with would be kind of neat (I have a slim, so I never had either feature.)
I don't pirate. I occasionally boycott a publisher, and then I simply do without their games (I'm looking at you, Ubisoft.) But I'd love to be able to disconnect my PS2 from my TV.
There have been some murmurs that this will be possible soon. The only question will be whether the cat-and-mouse game Sony will be playing with pirates will be too annoying.
Sony, bring back OtherOS and PS2 emulation, and I'll have no interest in this mod!
Re:Banned from PSN... (Score:2, Insightful)
Which has what to do with his point?
Something that so few care about hardly "ruins" a console.
Re:Shame it had to come to this... (Score:2, Insightful)
Sony makes consoles for gamers, not geeks who want cheap processing power. They need you to buy games for that piece of hardware to make some profit, that's why they try to crush any other use for it.
The rest of the PS3 owners bought it to play games, so when some obscure option that less than one percent users even tried, it's no surprise no one cares.
One user said that the hack can be used for something else other than pirating? Well what is it?
Another said that you can buy an old version and play pirated games with it, all under 200 USD. The best games are online multiplayer. If you want to pirate games, then the Xbox is cheaper and easier to use.
Re:It does make homebrew *possible*. (Score:4, Insightful)
Because there's tons of free and useful software for the iPhone. While there may be some for the PS3, it's definitely not a multi-purpose device.
I haven't seen a lot of useful stuff in the Cydia store. There are a handful of moderately useful things, hundreds of themes, and a lot of stuff which, by all appearences, is pretty useless and would probably be approved by Apple if the developer bothered to submit it.
There isn't much available for the PS3 right now because the jailbreak just freaking happened. Give it time. If someone can port a decent media center (like XBMC) to the PS3, that alone would be reason enough to mod it. Not to mention, as I posted elsewhere, the possibility of restoring OtherOS and PS2 emulation.
Let's be honest (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't expect that Sony will lose many sales over this. Considering that they may still be selling it at a loss and hoping to make up for it in game sales may actually net them more money as there were at least a few [google.com] people who were using them to make clusters.
Re:It does make homebrew *possible*. (Score:3, Insightful)
While there may be some for the PS3, it's definitely not a multi-purpose device.
One could say the same thing about an unjailbroken iPhone. Especially before the third party scene forced Apple to implement some obviously missing features.
The PS3 is only not a multi-purpose device because Sony keeps trying to force it to be that way.
Re:Linux on ps3? Give me a break (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm a full time linux user and I also own a ps3 for two years now. However, I never tried to install linux on it because it does it's job well for what I can't do on my linux system - play games. I wouldn't be surprised if most slashdotters that posted so far don't even use linux on their desktop let alone own a ps3. So what's up with the hate?
From your point of view they took away a feature you never used. Now imagine Dell forced a new BIOS that would disable Linux from booting on your PC. Because "nobody uses linux". What would you say then?
I bought the PS3 for 3 things, linux, movies and games.
I used my PS3 as a thin client mostly. But also as a media center. But now thats no longer possible.
Re:Where's the update? (Score:3, Insightful)
> If they don't get off their ass and release it I'm going to have to go buy a Sony 3D Blu-Ray player...
Ah, that isn't exactly incentive for them to update PS3s to support Blu-Ray. It is, in fact, the exact opposite.
Re:It does make homebrew *possible*. (Score:1, Insightful)
good news for PC gamers (Score:4, Insightful)
Now that there is no unhacked console left, maybe the consolization of PC games will slow down a bit. And maybe Sony will finally release the PS4, so that PC graphics can finally move ahead. It has been 3 years since Crysis. PC games have been stalled in terms of graphics because the better the graphics are on the PC version the more difficult it is to port to the old tech on the consoles.
Re:Banned from PSN... (Score:3, Insightful)
Nice way to turn this around.
The hackers didn't make Sony ban them from PSN, Sony pulled the trigger themselves. Regardless of weather they are legally within their rights to do so, it still was Sony's choice.
But console gamers keep telling me consoles are cheap (despite console games costing A$20 more then PC games.)
Further more, it's not. I used to have a modded Xbox 1, I used it to run XBMC and used it as a cheap media centre. I didn't play games on it, not even pirated ones. A lot of people are looking for cheap hardware to run a simple function on (like playing video's from a hard drive). Unfortunately nothing like my old Xbox 1 exists anymore thanks to overzealous content controls so I ended up building a media centre PC out of parts of old PC's.
good they lost (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Naturally, the usual OMGWTFPIRACY folks arrive. (Score:5, Insightful)
"And the latest report is that the next firmware update is going to disable the USB ports"
BULLSHIT.
Sorry, but I have to call this one out for what it is.
The USB ports are how the controllers are used during certain updates or if they're out of power. The USB ports also are how you plug in things like the Playstation Eye, a peripheral that Sony themselves sell and are relying on for their "Move" push.
They will not now, nor ever, disable the USB ports, this is some sort of forum echo-chamber nonsense or an outright troll that's somehow gained credence.
Especially when an update to their USB driver will destroy this jailbreak just as well.
Re:That seems a bit hyperbolic, no? (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Banned from PSN... (Score:3, Insightful)
> I'm sorry, but the cold hard truth is that the OtherOS doesn't have all that much value.
To you.
Actually, it has lost the PS/3 customer base (Score:3, Insightful)
Given what Sony did by removing the "other OS" feature after it was used for a hack, I think I can safely say that there is no way you cannot trust Sony not to retrospectively kill other features later. I don't hack my PS/3, but the "other OS" feature was a reason for me to buy it, so the "upgrade" isn't (and has thus not happened) because I refuse to pay the price for something I didn't do, and lose a feature I PAID FOR and which is on the product description.
Imagine what happens if someone finds a way to hack the box via a movie feature - given their approach to "other OS" it is not totally bizarre to expect them to nuke the "play video" feature in a next release, so thanks Sony, but there is not going to be another penny spent on anything PS/3, or anything else that is remote changeable. Quite simply, the PS/3 as a product is dead to me, and research for any new kit (whatever type) will certainly not begin with Sony.
If a company cannot take into account a certain amount of customisation when it gets a device out in public it suggests it is totally hopeless at both market analysis and crisis management. To me, that spells "incompetence".
No thanks.
Re:The only thing Waninkoko is famous for... (Score:4, Insightful)
Nah... I have followed the Wiiscene for quite some time (including the demise of TehSkeen, Marcan's whiny rants,etc ) and some "scene" guys are angry at Waninkoko/Wiigator, etc because they release stuff allowing to run backups.
See, there is a certain segment of the WiiScene which are a bunch of Mother Theressas and the only mention of backup launcher gets their panties in a bunch.
Other segment just do not see software itself as "evil" or bad and use whatever tools there are to increase the functionality of the console (as other person commented in this story for the PS3, it is good being able to rip your games into a USB drive).
And of course there is people who use such tools to steal software.
Re:when will they learn.. (Score:3, Insightful)
It goes beyond that.
I bought a console to play PS3 games.
Sony will release (or rather, already has released) a firmware which disables certain things on my PS3.
I have the choice to not update. If I don't, I don't get PSN. That's fine.
In 2 months, there will be games which won't function unless they're booted on the newest firmware. That's not fine. Now I have a PS3 which won't play every PS3 game unless I update the firmware and lose features. Sony is holding functionality which I purchased hostage. That's no bueno.
Re:It does make homebrew *possible*. (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah, I suppose I've heard of chroot jails as a concept. I'm not sure I'm willing to concede that jailbreaking is that specific a term. Also it doesn't have much bearing on the whole "iPhone hack good, ps3 hack bad" aregument that seems to have kicked off.
"I think most people (not most technical people) would disagree. The primary goal of jailbreaking an iPhone is probably not piracy. The primary goal of modding consoles tends to be piracy."
That may be so, or at least it may have been so. I'm less convinced as the piracy angle on phones seems to be growing rapidly.
"In court, for example, this is likely going to matter in certain cases."
Well, courts and reason/reality haven't been too closely married in recent times. This is an annoyance though.
Indeed, the PS3 jailbreak is free now. It wasn't at first. I really don't think that's relevant though, except inasmuch as noting that lots of people were coughing up the cost of two games in order to play unlimited backups (or, possibly, to do homebrew which doesn't even exist yet.)
Well it's possible I am just weird, but I was tempted to do the hack just because it was interesting. And "backups", sign me up for those. Not the pirate kind. Don't see why I shouldn't be able to load my games from my hard drive for quicker loading and less farting about with disks.
I'm still amazed that a system crack like this, that has the potential for other operating systems and software, should have to be justified or defended on /. though.
This place has changed, and not for the better.
Re:Linux on ps3? Give me a break (Score:1, Insightful)
Buying a PS3 for linux is like buying a pogo stick for your daily 30 mile commute. Sure it's possible, but there are so many better options that I don't no why people would even consider it.
Re:Banned from PSN... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:good they lost (Score:3, Insightful)
Because I don't blame the woman whose husband beats her when dinner is undercooked.