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Sony Has Lost the PS3 Hacking War
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).
Maybe this battle was a loss, but as long as Song can force firmware updates, the war is far from over.
There's aslo an iOS version being made that'll run from a jailbroken iPhone.
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.
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.
Unshockingly enough, Sony crushed a commercial seller of a PS3 mod device like a bug. Even if the law weren't probably unfavorable to the sellers, Sony probably could have just tied them up in injunctions forever anyway. Shocking.
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...
Sorry. Sony already ruined their own expensive console by removing marketed features after the fact.
"He who can destroy a thing, controls a thing." --Paul Atreides, Dune
Even worse, he's directly responsible for bricking hundreds of consoles due to shoddy code (his "custom updater" and "custom downgrader" saga; at one point running one of his tools bricked your console 100% of the time) and generally speaking hasn't made any contributions to homebrew, instead opting to cobble together pieces of homebrew code to make pirac^H^H^H^H^Hbackup tools, often without following the licences.
He's only jumping on the PS3 bandwagon to get some attention, which is something he loves. If he ever releases anything halfway meaningful for the PS3, I can pretty much guarantee it'll be a port or simple combination of existing tools in a slightly more "marketable" way, with a "healthy" dose of his sponsor's logos, as his Wii releases always have been.
True story: he released his USB loader about 20-30 days after someone actually wrote a high-speed USB driver, which was the final piece of the puzzle. For kicks, after his announcement but before the release, I proceeded to independently create an equivalent USB loader, to gauge how much work had to go into it. ~200 lines of code and 6 hours, not counting time spent writing a silly menu and slapping in logos.
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?
I don't know what kind of crack I was on, but I suspect it was decaf.
"It makes you smile that you can use one homebrew console to hack another to get homebrew on that console."
Yo dawg! I heard you like hacking homebrew, so we we put hack in your homebrew so you can hack homebrew while you hack!
"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.
http://exophase.com/ps3/ps3-firmware-3-42-hits-network-update-18063.htm:
w00t
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.
Ubuntu is an African word meaning 'I can't configure Debian'