Jailbreak Clampdown Aftermath

   Now that Sony has succeeded in stopping Jailbreak sales and distribution in Australia and is suing a mod reseller in the States, the outrage has begun. Y'know the outrage from pirates. Two of the more common comments from the outraged message board participants over the past few days are listed below in bold.

All I wanted was to do homebrew on the PS3
   Homebrew's available on the PC and you can do all the homebrew you want on that. Homebrew's also available on the Xbox 360 and the Wii but most people with modified consoles don't really use them for homebrew. They have modified consoles so they can play pirated software.

I can make my own "Jailbreak" by using the PSGroove open source code
   The guy who asked if he could burn the source code onto a disc and Jailbreak his PS3 that way probably wouldn't get the job done but yes, there are alternative hacks weeding their way through the net now. One recently announced method is Jailbreaking the PS3 by using an Android phone while another uses a Nokia N900 mobile phone with the PSFreedom source code (patched to play backups). The cat's out of the bag so DIY Jailbreak is a reality at this point. Sony's hope is that most aspiring pirates won't have the reading comprehension or the ability to follow the instructions in order to perform the mod themselves.

Jailbreak injunction upheld

   Sony has prevailed against the Jailbreak - an Australian Federal Court has issued an order that prevents the mod resellers named in Sony's injunction from selling, distributing, or offering the Jailbreak in Australia.

The text of the court order follows below:

THE COURT ORDERS BY CONSENT BUT WITHOUT ADMISSIONS, THAT:

1. Upon the Applicants undertaking to the Court to:

(i)submit to such order (if any) as the Court may consider to be just for the payment of compensation, to be assessed by the Court or as it may direct, to any person whether or not a party, adversely affected by the operation of Orders 3 to 5 set out below or any continuation (with or without variation); and

(ii)pay the compensation referred to in (a) to the person or persons there referred to.

1.2 ORDERS that, until further order, the First, Second, Third and Fourth Respondents and each of them, whether by themselves, their servants or agents, be restrained from doing any of the following acts with respect to all and any Universal Serial Bus devices described as "PSJailbreak" in Exhibit PJC-1 of the affidavit of Peter John Chalk sworn on 26 August 2010 and filed herein, as packaged, and distributed or threatened to be distributed by the Respondents (PSJailbreak Devices):

(i)importing them into Australia with the intention of providing them to another person;

(ii)distributing them to another person;

(iii)offering them to the public;

(iv)providing them to another person; and/or

(v)otherwise dealing in them.

save that it will not be a breach of Order 2(a) for the First or Second Respondent to import all and any PSJailbreak Devices in respect of which any orders were placed prior to 27 August 2010, provided that any such importation is subject to the undertaking in paragraph 5 below.

1.3 ORDERS that, the First, Second, Third and Fourth Respondents and each of them deliver up to the solicitors for the Applicants, to be held until further order, any and all PSJailbreak Devices in those Respondents' possession custody or control.

1.4 ORDERS that, until further order, the First, Second, Third and Fourth Respondents and each of them continue to deliver up to the solicitors for the Applicants, to be held until further order, any and all PSJailbreak Devices that come into those Respondents' possession custody or control (including the sample device referred to in paragraph 7 of the Affidavit of the Second Respondent affirmed on 2 September 2010), forthwith upon them doing so.

1.5 NOTES the undertaking to the Court given by the First and Second Respondents by their counsel:

(i)forthwith to notify the supplier of PSJailbreak Devices (identified as China Sun Trading Limited of China, being the beneficiary of account number 817-374473-838 at the HSBC Hong Kong branch, 1 Queen's Road Central, Hong Kong with SWIFT Address HSBCHKHHHKH) that any goods ordered by the First and Second Respondents are to be shipped to Blake Dawson to the attention of Peter Chalk at Level 26, 181 William Street, Melbourne, VIC, 3000 and not to the First or Second Respondents; and

(ii)to deliver up in accordance with Order 4 above to the solicitors for the Applicants any PSJailbreak Devices received.

1.6 NOTES the undertaking to the Court of Blake Dawson:

(i)to hold any such goods securely subject to any further order of the Court; and

(ii)promptly to notify the solicitors for Respondents of the receipt of any such goods and to supply copies of any documentation received with them.

1.7 RESERVES LIBERTY to the parties to apply on 24 hours' notice, including for the purpose of the First and Second Respondents giving notice on or after 9 September 2010 that they wish the matter to be relisted for the resumption of the Applicants' application for interlocutory relief.

1.8 ORDERS that costs be reserved.

Jailbreak Injunction Decision Tomorrow

   An Australian Federal Court will decide tomorrow if the injunction against the sale of the Playstation 3 Jailbreak becomes permanent. I've bet $30 on a wager against a scenester that the ban stays and the mod sellers are SOL. Why $30? That was all I had in my pocket at the time we were shooting the shit about mods and pondering the history of the universe. The Jailbreak issue is probably moot however because the PSGroove is out and in the wild.

   The PSGroove project was revealed a couple of days ago but it's an ethical hack. Piracy isn't enabled on the USB injection code but it's only a matter of time before someone re-enables the piracy features so that game dumps to HDD and backups are playable. Once a hack like that is released, it's out there forever and free for anyone to use, modify, and engineer for whatever reason. That's the nature of the internet where all of your embarrassing photos, dumb lines, and dick jokes are saved on someone's server or hard drive for all of eternity.

Australian Federal Court extends ban on PS3 Jailbreak

   Sony's injunction against sales of the PS3 Jailbreak mod has been extended by Australian Federal Court until Friday of this week. Sony is seeking a permanent ban on sales of the Jailbreak which will make the device illegal to sell in Australia.

A snippet from today's Sidney Morning Herald is pasted below:

"The judge who first heard the matter, Justice Dodds-Streeton, will again hear it this Friday. Justice Kenny heard it today and ordered that the orders that were previously made by Justice Dodds-Streeton be continued until Friday, when the case would go back before that judge."

Sony succeeds in banning PS3 Jailbreak

   Last week, Sony of Australia sought an injunction to halt the sales of the Playstation 3 Jailbreak USB device. The company succeeded in convincing the Australian Federal Court to uphold the injunction and the three Australian retailers named in the case have been blocked from selling the Jailbreak. Tomorrow, Sony will file to make the ban permanent in Australia.

   Snippets from today's article from the Sidney Morning Herald follows below:

"Judge Julie Anne Dodds-Streeton issued the temporary ban ahead of a hearing tomorrow morning where Sony will make its case for a permanent block on sales."

"This is the first time the security of the PS3 has been broken and the injunction requires the distributors to hand all of their stock of the device to Sony. The company will then have licence to analyse the chips and work on a way of blocking them, with Justice Dodds-Streeton's order allowing for even "destructive analysis"."

   Following the article, there are 54 comments as of 10:00AM this morning. Some use the premise of "freedom" and "homebrew" to justify the ability to pirate software. The comments from two mod resellers at the end of the article also explain their fight for the little guy, battling Goliath, and how the Federal Court is setting dangerous precedents.

   The injunction currently only applies to Australian jurisdictions but mod chip sellers in Canada seem to think that they're not affected by the action in Australia. Looking at previous actions in Canada, Sony has already shut down mod vendors in previous years and they effectively shut down Lik-Sang in Hong Kong by filing a lawsuit against the company which was not answered. In that case, Sony won by default judgment because Lik-Sang representatives did not appear in court.

Playstation 3 Jailbreak Sales Halted

   Sony has convinced an Australian Federal Court to issue an injunction against presales of the Playstation 3 Jailbreak mod which plugs into the PS3's USB port. Based on information released thus far, the Jailbreak allows the Playstation 3 to boot pirated software from a hard drive. Further information appears to indicate that the Playstation 3's normal boot process is interrupted and the software on the Jailbreak allows the Playstation 3 console to mimic the functionality of a development station PS3. An original Playstation 3 game is still required to load the games stored on the hard drive but the potential for rampant piracy allowed Sony to obtain the injunction. Three Australian modchip sellers were named in the injunction:

1) Quantronics
2) OzModChips.com
3) ModSupplier.com

   Although modchips are illegal in most parts of the world, they are legal in Australia. The injunction is in force until August 31. If the injunction is stayed, the PS3 Jailbreak will remain unavailable for sale.

   The Jailbreak website also lists resellers in Canada, Europe, and the United States. Modchips and copyright circumvention devices are illegal in the States and it is unclear if the US-based seller "Shop PS Jailbreak" is aware of the ramifications and legal liabilities of selling an outlawed product. Stay tuned for the drama to unfold.