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First PS3 Jailbreaker Arrested In South Africa

Posted by timothy on from the how-quaintly-soviet-of-them dept.

GusGous writes "South African newspaper Beeld reports that the first person known to be arrested for jailbreaking the Playstation 3 was arrested in Parktown, Johannesburg today. This raid was conducted by the South African Police Service's Commercial Crime Unit, after receiving criminal complaints from the South African Federation Against Copyright Theft (SAFACT). Members of the police were assisted by the South African Revenue Service (SARS) Computer Forensics Lab. The police confiscated goods of around R100 000 (14000 USD)." See also this story in Afrikaans; Google translation.

5 of 119 comments (clear)

  1. Re:PS3 jailbreaking by gman003 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Well, when it said they confiscated $14,000 worth of stuff, you can easily deduce that he was jailbreaking at an industrial scale, not a personal one. And honestly, raids against people doing that sort of thing is pretty justifiable.

  2. Re:PS3 jailbreaking by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    And honestly, raids against people doing that sort of thing is pretty justifiable.

    If you sell me a game that's supposed to be original from the publisher, you've committed fraud. If you sell me a game that I know is pirated, there shouldn't be anything illegal about that, even though it's immoral. Remember, the government exists to prevent crime, not sin.

  3. Re:The war on information continues... by shentino · · Score: 1, Insightful

    In the long run the greedy fucks benefitting from the thought monopoly will have long since laughed all the way to the bank, lived high on the hog, and left a big fat corpse.

    They do not CARE about the long term for humanity.

  4. Question by msobkow · · Score: 4, Insightful

    What has theoretical freedom of ideas have to do with a full-scale commercial piracy operation?

    --
    I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
    1. Re:Question by westlake · · Score: 3, Insightful

      What has theoretical freedom of ideas have to do with a full-scale commercial piracy operation?

      Nothing whatever.

      Which shows how impoverished and fraudulent these cries for "Freedom!" have become.

      P2P is the geek's middle class entitlement. Nothing more. The investment in tech and services required makes that plain. The AAA game demands AAA hardware.

      Playing the pirated HD video on the 60" screen doesn't make you a hero.

      It makes you a thief.