11 ms·

Sony suing fail0verflow & geohot over PS3 jailbreak [pdf]

64 points by angusgr 16y ago

christoph 16y ago
I personally don't think this is a good move from Sony. Apple seem to have the right stance with their hardware being compromised - pretty much just ignore it. Bringing a legal action like this just raises the public awareness to the hack (not good for Sony). It pisses more hackers off (not good for Sony) and it doesn't fix what seems to be an unfixable problem for Sony. I'm sure the courts will be made aware that Sony removed a "key" feature/selling point of a console and left consumers with little choice about how to re-enable that feature. Anyway, Geohot shouldn't have been such an egomaniac, the keys/tools could have been leaked online anonymously and he wouldn't be in legal trouble. Still, I can see an out of court settlement of some kind on the horizon...
- bendauphinee 16y ago
  While I agree that he is being somewhat of an egomaniac, it does give Sony a big target to shoot at, therefore allowing the court case that may set a good precedent.
- Xuzz 16y ago
  (Honestly I don't see how geohot did anything, here, really: he used one exploit to apply the work of fail0verflow, who presented at CCC, to a new part of the PS3. All the important parts, like the private key calculation, were already presented before he posted anything.)
- loire280 16y ago
  Apple makes their money from hardware -- software sales are just icing on the cake. Sony, however, has to take piracy threats (since even well-intentioned cracking will lead to piracy) very seriously because they make all of their money from software sales. Sony's ineffectual attempts to lock down the PSP (starting with the last-minute homebrew policy reversal) probably contributed to the firmware hacking community's fervor. However, after the rampant piracy on the PSP platform, I think Sony is going to take any firmware hacks very seriously. Gamers have proven to be perfectly willing to pirate games if given the opportunity.
  - axod 16y ago
    Sonys problem is that they make the most expensive games console hardware, but make a loss selling it. If I were them I'd fix that first. And get rid of the ridiculous and outdated blu-ray crap. Spinny disc things? In this day and age?
    - MoreMoschops 16y ago
      I remember when Nintendo said that. You'll note that the spinny disc camp slaughtered them. Spinny discs are little sheets of polycarbonate. They're ridiculously cheap to make.
- sorghum 16y ago
  I wouldn't say Apple ignores jailbreakers; while they haven't tried to sue anyone making the software (as far as I know), they did try to block the DMCA exemption for jailbreaking: http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/02/apple-says-jailbreaking-illegal http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/02/apple-says-jailbreaking...
- bad_user 16y ago
  Apple sues Wired over netbook hackintosh video: http://tinyurl.com/4d2f4rv http://tinyurl.com/4d2f4rv Apple sues clone maker Psystar: http://tinyurl.com/6r7jad http://tinyurl.com/6r7jad I.e. they are only quite as long as people keep buying their hardware, and got nothing to do with "pissing hackers off".
Xuzz 16y ago
Incredibly relevant: Daeken's Hardware Hacker Manifesto: http://daeken.com/the-hardware-hacker-manifesto http://daeken.com/the-hardware-hacker-manifesto Sony probably has the upper hand legally here. The DMCA seems to be pretty explicit about these kind of this, at least from my non-lawyerly reading of it. Even so, this is quite unprecedented. Apple and Nintendo have both had devices hacked, often by these same people (there's at least two iPhone Dev-Team members there, four members of Team Twiizers, and, of course, geohot), but they never took any kind of legal action. (Somewhat unrelated, but funny: even Nintendo found out "bushing"'s real name and phone number. I wonder why Sony didn't go through that trouble and referred to him pseudonymously.)
- daeken 16y ago
  > Sony probably has the upper hand legally here. The DMCA seems to be pretty explicit about these kind of this, at least from my non-lawyerly reading of it. IANAL, but there are a few things that Sony has going against them: 1) The DMCA interoperability exemptions may apply to this work, although obviously not the piracy side of things (although these guys have not produced anything that is for the sole purpose of copying content), and 2) They are conflating these attacks purely with piracy, which will make their case look far worse when a judge looks at it. Whether or not these things actually matter in the end is up in the air, but this is by no means a cut and dry case. I'm personally excited to see this come to pass, for the precedent this could set, and I hope for the best for bushing et al. Edit: This is the type of tweet that can lose a case... "The FAIL0VERFLOW Defendants intentionally circumvented SCEA’s TPMs, accessed the PS3 System and trafficked in Circumvention Devices and SCEA’s proprietary information, with full knowledge that their unlawful conduct would irreparably harm SCEA. Indeed, five days prior to appearing at the Chaos Conference, Bushing echoed a fellow hacker’s comment anticipating this irreparable harm: “Last chance to sell any Sony stock you may have.”"
- eli 16y ago
  Unprecedented? In this case decided in 2005, Sony received over $6 million in a copyright infringement judgment against a small online retailer who violated the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), 17 U.S.C. §§ 1201 et seq., by selling computer chips that allowed unauthorized copies of PlayStation games to be played on the PlayStation console. http://www.patentarcade.com/2010/07/case-analysis-sony-v-filipiak.html http://www.patentarcade.com/2010/07/case-analysis-sony-v-fil...
mycroftiv 16y ago
So, let's see if we can summarize the story in broad outline. Sony releases the PS3 with the included functionality of installing an alternate operating system. Users purchase PS3s with this ability. Sony changes its mind about the benefits of this feature and removes it via a software update. Users take steps to regain the full functionality of the devices they purchased. Sony sues the users for this action.
- electromagnetic 16y ago
  I'm waiting for the inevitable case of gun manufacturers suing their customers for firing their guns. I believe it's inevitable.
  - drivebyacct2 16y ago
    That's not really a fair comparison, especially considering the level of discussion the DMCA goes into when covering what is considered fair use and what sorts of reverse engineering is prohibited. It'd be more like a gun manufacturer suing because someone turned their gun into an automatic rifle (jailbreak). And then spread instructions on how to do it (homebrew). And then a bunch of people held up grocery stores (piracy).
    - stewartbutler 16y ago
      Not much better. Modifying a gun to turn it into a weapon means you are taking a legal weapon and turning it into something illegal. The import and creation of automatic weapons in the US is restricted to law enforcement and military. Mere POSSESSION of an unregistered automatic weapon is a felony offense. The two cases are completely unrelated. Jailbreaking a PS3 is equivalent to jailbreaking a phone, with the possible exception that doing so may be a violation of DMCA, since it theoretically enables the copying of DVD/BDVD/games.
  - wh-uws 16y ago
    A better comparison would be suing customers for modifying the guns. I remember I saw a documentary once where a company was sued because it sold (I believe) handguns that were easily modifiable to be fully automatic
milkshakes 16y ago
Finally, SCEA will likely prevail on its claim under §1030(a)(7)(B), which prohibits “intent to extort from any person any money or other thing of value” by threatening “to obtain information from a protected computer without authorization or in excess of authorization or to impair the confidentiality of information obtained from a protected computer without authorization or by exceeding authorized access.” Hotz violated this provision when, in the same post in which the published SCEA’s Keys, he attempted to obtain from SCEA “a thing of value” in the form of employment: “if you want your next console to be secure, get in touch with me.” geohot offers to work for them and help them build something that's actually secure, they sue him for "extortion". beautiful.
Sephr 16y ago
How the heck is "if you want your next console to be secure, get in touch with me" extortion?
- mquander 16y ago
  Seriously? We can argue the ethics all day, but from Sony's point of view, this series of events is isomorphic to an expert lockpicker breaking into their office building and then sending a letter saying "if you want your next building to be secure, get in touch with me."
  - anonymoushn 16y ago
    If the end user does not own the Playstation 3 (it seems to be owned by Sony, from Sony's point of view), I wonder what he paid $499 for.
    - loire280 16y ago
      I wonder if it means anything legally that (at least for the initial period of the console's life) Sony was selling the device for less than cost with the expectation that they would make up the difference with game sales. I think there is some moral greyness to buying an essentially subsidized console with no intention to buy games -- though now that they probably make a profit on the hardware, that point is moot.
      - anonymoushn 16y ago
        The practice of buying the console with no intention to buy games seems to have been somewhat common among academics, who used clusters of the machines for things completely unrelated to gaming. My research advisor at some terrible state university in Texas had about forty of them for algorithms research purposes. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_3_cluster http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_3_cluster
        loire280 16y ago
elliottcarlson 16y ago
Various sources [1] are stating that the Sony PS3 TOS allows Sony to disable units remotely leaving them unusable for both online and offline use. While I would be fine with being banned from their network, I believe the hardware should be mine to do with as I please - with the obvious exclusion of piracy. If I want to get Linux on there, then that should be my right as the owner of the hardware - same if I want to run custom firmware to allow me to do hobby development. Both their supposed right to unleash a ban wave, as well as their lawsuit against Geohot et al just doesn't make sense - why can a lawsuit like this even be allowed to happen? (This question is linked to the fact that Geohot purposely did not add peek/poke functionality on what he released to ensure that piracy would not be possible using his tools - even if others have since added that in) [1] http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-in-theory-psn-jailbreaking http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-in-theory-p...
deleted 16y ago
[deleted]

64 points by angusgr 16y ago

I personally don't think this is a good move from Sony. Apple seem to have the right stance with their hardware being compromised - pretty much just ignore it. Bringing a legal action like this just raises the public awareness to the hack (not good for Sony). It pisses more hackers off (not good for Sony) and it doesn't fix what seems to be an unfixable problem for Sony. I'm sure the courts will be made aware that Sony removed a "key" feature/selling point of a console and left consumers with little choice about how to re-enable that feature. Anyway, Geohot shouldn't have been such an egomaniac, the keys/tools could have been leaked online anonymously and he wouldn't be in legal trouble. Still, I can see an out of court settlement of some kind on the horizon...

bendauphinee 16y ago
While I agree that he is being somewhat of an egomaniac, it does give Sony a big target to shoot at, therefore allowing the court case that may set a good precedent.
Xuzz 16y ago
(Honestly I don't see how geohot did anything, here, really: he used one exploit to apply the work of fail0verflow, who presented at CCC, to a new part of the PS3. All the important parts, like the private key calculation, were already presented before he posted anything.)
loire280 16y ago
Apple makes their money from hardware -- software sales are just icing on the cake. Sony, however, has to take piracy threats (since even well-intentioned cracking will lead to piracy) very seriously because they make all of their money from software sales. Sony's ineffectual attempts to lock down the PSP (starting with the last-minute homebrew policy reversal) probably contributed to the firmware hacking community's fervor. However, after the rampant piracy on the PSP platform, I think Sony is going to take any firmware hacks very seriously. Gamers have proven to be perfectly willing to pirate games if given the opportunity.
- axod 16y ago
  Sonys problem is that they make the most expensive games console hardware, but make a loss selling it. If I were them I'd fix that first. And get rid of the ridiculous and outdated blu-ray crap. Spinny disc things? In this day and age?
  - MoreMoschops 16y ago
    I remember when Nintendo said that. You'll note that the spinny disc camp slaughtered them. Spinny discs are little sheets of polycarbonate. They're ridiculously cheap to make.
sorghum 16y ago
I wouldn't say Apple ignores jailbreakers; while they haven't tried to sue anyone making the software (as far as I know), they did try to block the DMCA exemption for jailbreaking: http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/02/apple-says-jailbreaking-illegal http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/02/apple-says-jailbreaking...
bad_user 16y ago
Apple sues Wired over netbook hackintosh video: http://tinyurl.com/4d2f4rv http://tinyurl.com/4d2f4rv Apple sues clone maker Psystar: http://tinyurl.com/6r7jad http://tinyurl.com/6r7jad I.e. they are only quite as long as people keep buying their hardware, and got nothing to do with "pissing hackers off".

Xuzz 16y ago

Incredibly relevant: Daeken's Hardware Hacker Manifesto: http://daeken.com/the-hardware-hacker-manifesto http://daeken.com/the-hardware-hacker-manifesto Sony probably has the upper hand legally here. The DMCA seems to be pretty explicit about these kind of this, at least from my non-lawyerly reading of it. Even so, this is quite unprecedented. Apple and Nintendo have both had devices hacked, often by these same people (there's at least two iPhone Dev-Team members there, four members of Team Twiizers, and, of course, geohot), but they never took any kind of legal action. (Somewhat unrelated, but funny: even Nintendo found out "bushing"'s real name and phone number. I wonder why Sony didn't go through that trouble and referred to him pseudonymously.)

daeken 16y ago
> Sony probably has the upper hand legally here. The DMCA seems to be pretty explicit about these kind of this, at least from my non-lawyerly reading of it. IANAL, but there are a few things that Sony has going against them: 1) The DMCA interoperability exemptions may apply to this work, although obviously not the piracy side of things (although these guys have not produced anything that is for the sole purpose of copying content), and 2) They are conflating these attacks purely with piracy, which will make their case look far worse when a judge looks at it. Whether or not these things actually matter in the end is up in the air, but this is by no means a cut and dry case. I'm personally excited to see this come to pass, for the precedent this could set, and I hope for the best for bushing et al. Edit: This is the type of tweet that can lose a case... "The FAIL0VERFLOW Defendants intentionally circumvented SCEA’s TPMs, accessed the PS3 System and trafficked in Circumvention Devices and SCEA’s proprietary information, with full knowledge that their unlawful conduct would irreparably harm SCEA. Indeed, five days prior to appearing at the Chaos Conference, Bushing echoed a fellow hacker’s comment anticipating this irreparable harm: “Last chance to sell any Sony stock you may have.”"
eli 16y ago
Unprecedented? In this case decided in 2005, Sony received over $6 million in a copyright infringement judgment against a small online retailer who violated the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), 17 U.S.C. §§ 1201 et seq., by selling computer chips that allowed unauthorized copies of PlayStation games to be played on the PlayStation console. http://www.patentarcade.com/2010/07/case-analysis-sony-v-filipiak.html http://www.patentarcade.com/2010/07/case-analysis-sony-v-fil...

mycroftiv 16y ago

So, let's see if we can summarize the story in broad outline. Sony releases the PS3 with the included functionality of installing an alternate operating system. Users purchase PS3s with this ability. Sony changes its mind about the benefits of this feature and removes it via a software update. Users take steps to regain the full functionality of the devices they purchased. Sony sues the users for this action.

electromagnetic 16y ago
I'm waiting for the inevitable case of gun manufacturers suing their customers for firing their guns. I believe it's inevitable.
- drivebyacct2 16y ago
  That's not really a fair comparison, especially considering the level of discussion the DMCA goes into when covering what is considered fair use and what sorts of reverse engineering is prohibited. It'd be more like a gun manufacturer suing because someone turned their gun into an automatic rifle (jailbreak). And then spread instructions on how to do it (homebrew). And then a bunch of people held up grocery stores (piracy).
  - stewartbutler 16y ago
    Not much better. Modifying a gun to turn it into a weapon means you are taking a legal weapon and turning it into something illegal. The import and creation of automatic weapons in the US is restricted to law enforcement and military. Mere POSSESSION of an unregistered automatic weapon is a felony offense. The two cases are completely unrelated. Jailbreaking a PS3 is equivalent to jailbreaking a phone, with the possible exception that doing so may be a violation of DMCA, since it theoretically enables the copying of DVD/BDVD/games.
- wh-uws 16y ago
  A better comparison would be suing customers for modifying the guns. I remember I saw a documentary once where a company was sued because it sold (I believe) handguns that were easily modifiable to be fully automatic

milkshakes 16y ago

Finally, SCEA will likely prevail on its claim under §1030(a)(7)(B), which prohibits “intent to extort from any person any money or other thing of value” by threatening “to obtain information from a protected computer without authorization or in excess of authorization or to impair the confidentiality of information obtained from a protected computer without authorization or by exceeding authorized access.” Hotz violated this provision when, in the same post in which the published SCEA’s Keys, he attempted to obtain from SCEA “a thing of value” in the form of employment: “if you want your next console to be secure, get in touch with me.” geohot offers to work for them and help them build something that's actually secure, they sue him for "extortion". beautiful.

Sephr 16y ago

How the heck is "if you want your next console to be secure, get in touch with me" extortion?

mquander 16y ago
Seriously? We can argue the ethics all day, but from Sony's point of view, this series of events is isomorphic to an expert lockpicker breaking into their office building and then sending a letter saying "if you want your next building to be secure, get in touch with me."
- anonymoushn 16y ago
  If the end user does not own the Playstation 3 (it seems to be owned by Sony, from Sony's point of view), I wonder what he paid $499 for.
  - loire280 16y ago
    I wonder if it means anything legally that (at least for the initial period of the console's life) Sony was selling the device for less than cost with the expectation that they would make up the difference with game sales. I think there is some moral greyness to buying an essentially subsidized console with no intention to buy games -- though now that they probably make a profit on the hardware, that point is moot.
    - anonymoushn 16y ago
      The practice of buying the console with no intention to buy games seems to have been somewhat common among academics, who used clusters of the machines for things completely unrelated to gaming. My research advisor at some terrible state university in Texas had about forty of them for algorithms research purposes. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_3_cluster http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_3_cluster
      - loire280 16y ago

elliottcarlson 16y ago

Various sources [1] are stating that the Sony PS3 TOS allows Sony to disable units remotely leaving them unusable for both online and offline use. While I would be fine with being banned from their network, I believe the hardware should be mine to do with as I please - with the obvious exclusion of piracy. If I want to get Linux on there, then that should be my right as the owner of the hardware - same if I want to run custom firmware to allow me to do hobby development. Both their supposed right to unleash a ban wave, as well as their lawsuit against Geohot et al just doesn't make sense - why can a lawsuit like this even be allowed to happen? (This question is linked to the fact that Geohot purposely did not add peek/poke functionality on what he released to ensure that piracy would not be possible using his tools - even if others have since added that in) [1] http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-in-theory-psn-jailbreaking http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-in-theory-p...

deleted 16y ago

[deleted]