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Forums - General - Geohot is now working at Facebook

The Fury on 27 June 2011
NJ5 said:
The Fury said:
NJ5 said:

No.

No?... that's it? great debate. Why no? If I give my mate a baseball bat to play with and then he goes and beats someone up with it, police are likely to ask me questions about why I gave the baseball bat to him, I'd then have to prove I didn't give my friend the baseball bat when I knew he'd use it in such a way.

Tell me why this isn't true. I'd like to know.

If that's what you mean by being in trouble iwith the police, OK... but I don't see how this has anything to do with Geohot. He didn't give anything to anyone directly, he just published some information on the Internet.

As I said before people have been hacking electronics for a very long time, and to my knowledge no one was ever found guilty of it... In fact, US courts specifically said jailbreaking should be legal. Why do you think the Geohot/Sony/PS3 case is special?

Yes, that is what I meant, sorry if I didn't put it across as well as I could have. I was just trying to online an example where someone giving someone else something can result in problems with the law. In the case of Mr Hotz, like you say he didn't nothing illegal. Which is why he was sued by Sony, which was their decision to, and why he didn't goto jail.

There is nothing special except maybe that of fan reaction. As the PS3 was for so long unhackable to play homebrew or pirated games, his achievement and afterwards consequences made it more of an issue then other 'jailbreaking' instances.



Hmm, pie.

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thranx on 27 June 2011
Joelcool7 said:

Again I never meant Geo was a criminal.

People argueing all he did was lawful and intended for lawful use is funny. Do you really think Geo was that Niave? to really believe his hack would only be used lawfully? He knew that his hack would be used unlawfully, much like the creators of Kazaa, LimeWire and Napster all were legal file sharing, but the creators knew that users would use those programs unlawfully.

A good metaphore for this

A store advertises 2 for 1 deal on 1TB hard drives for example (Offering other OS) a customer comes into the store and goes to the cashier with his two 1TB hard drives. The store (Sony) says you know what we aren't going to honour our deal, we won't give you the free 1TB hard drive. The customer is upset and legally has the right to that 1TB hard drive. So the store closes and the customer decides he's going to get his free hard drive, so he breaks into the store and takes it.Later that night a group of theives see the store with the glass broken, they pour in and clear out the shelves.

Now the customer had every right to that free hard drive. Lawfully the store was required to give it to him. However rather then say sue the store , press charges or such, he breaks in. Here's the problem, Geo (The customer) knew that by breaking into the store he was leaving it defenceless. He knew that chances are someone else is going to use his break (Hack) to steal from the store (Sony).

Now say a Police officer gets called out to this scene. Do you think the officer would see the customer (Geo) as innocent or guilty? He was innocent in taking what he was owed. But he broke the window that allowed the theives to steal from the store. He would likely be seen by the police officer as an accessory. He knew the crime was going to be commited and broke the glass anyways.

He was complacent in the crime. Thus no he's not guilty of a crime. He however did make one possible.

All those who say Geo was completely innocent. Do you all believe he really did not think anyone would use his hack to commit a crime?

He knew from day one that his hack would open Sony's security up to be robbed.

Now I know many people are fans of home brew and support GeoHot because he only took back what Sony had promised consumers. But his actions resulted in piracy and theft. He may not be the pirate or the theif but he made their break in possible.


on that same note sony should stop selling ps3's. without them supplying them to people, people would not be able to hack ps3 and then pirate games. look at sony enabling hackers and pirates, how dare they. Sony is hurting the industry with its enabling of piracy.



thranx on 27 June 2011
steverhcp02 said:
One of the few cases where it really is a matter of opinion who is to blame. I personally feel he knew exactly what he was doing. Do i think he did it to pirate games? Nope. But i believe he knew releasing the homebrew would allow others so i feel him being talented enough to homebrew, he should have exercised responsibility knowing what his release would allow people to do. Or been far more clear and concise on his stance on being against pirated games, urging and even pulling the homebrew instructions once it got out that it was happening. He straddled a fine line and because of that i think he knew exactly what his actions were and by that time the battle lines were drawn so he chose the pirates vs sony in his stance (as evident by his rap)

Hes still a young kid, he made some mistakes handling his talents, hopefully now that he works for one of the biggest corporations on earth and hes doing something with a boss and such his talent can be utilized in a much more productive way.


You do know he made it so his firmware did not allow piracy right? Other hackers altered his firmware or created their own. So again how is he at fault for others crimes? if you are going to blame him for supplying tools you better start bblaming sony and pc makers for also supplying the same tools.



Galaki on 27 June 2011

Let's just blame China, okay? They ensembled the parts.



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o_O.Q on 27 June 2011

lmfao it cracks me up that most of the people that defend these hackers don't have a ps3 or have a bias against sony in  general and therefore don't have to give a crap about the consequences of what people like geohot do... i'll break it down negative consequences of geohots actions :

sony was forced to remove linux functionality when he posted his orginal exploit to curb hackers interfering in online gaming and piracy :

 

http://gamercrave.com/ps3-hacker-geohot-on-lost-linux-support-im-sorry/2349/

an extract from that site :

 

"Sony has only pinned the change on “security concerns,” but hacker George “Geohot” Hotz, who released the first-ever PS3 hack earlier this year (preceded by several high-profile iPhone jailbreaks), which could ultimately allow piracy or other nefarious uses of the consoles, believes he played a role:

First off, I want to apologize to all the people who use Linux on their PS3. Before releasing, I weighed the pros and cons, and considered the possibility of an impact on OtherOS support"

 

later on even though he said he was sorry about his original exploit he chose to go against his word and saw it fit to post another exploit and once again consumers were harmed by his actions :

http://www.techtree.com/India/News/PS3_Hack_CoD_Modern_Warfare_Users_Bear_the_Brunt/551-114202-585.html

 

an extract from that site : 

"Not long after the prolific hacker George "geohot" Hotz made the PlayStation 3 root key public, hackers have it easy to exploit the consoles and its software. The first casualties being Infinity Ward's Call of Duty"

 

then sony is what imo was a justified retaliation to protect their consumers from this idiot went after him with a lawsuit and we all know what happened as a result of this lawsuit... the bottomline is had he kept his hacks and the effects of his hacks to himself no one would have cared but the point is he did not his actions affected the entire ps3 user base but i suppose they were also positive rresults : improved security 

 



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thranx on 27 June 2011
spurgeonryan said:
Wasn't it illegal what Geo did? Now that they work for Facebook make it easier for the authorities to find Geo?


no it was not illegal. there were never criminal charges of any kind filed. There was a civil suit that is all.



Kantor on 27 June 2011
thranx said:


on that same note sony should stop selling ps3's. without them supplying them to people, people would not be able to hack ps3 and then pirate games. look at sony enabling hackers and pirates, how dare they. Sony is hurting the industry with its enabling of piracy.

That's like saying it's the store founder's fault for founding the store, because if he hadn't, he wouldn't have been robbed.

You're also implying that Sony wanted this to happen, which is ridiculous.



(Former) Lead Moderator and (Eternal) VGC Detective

Fab_GS on 27 June 2011

Good for him.



steverhcp02 on 27 June 2011
thranx said:
steverhcp02 said:
One of the few cases where it really is a matter of opinion who is to blame. I personally feel he knew exactly what he was doing. Do i think he did it to pirate games? Nope. But i believe he knew releasing the homebrew would allow others so i feel him being talented enough to homebrew, he should have exercised responsibility knowing what his release would allow people to do. Or been far more clear and concise on his stance on being against pirated games, urging and even pulling the homebrew instructions once it got out that it was happening. He straddled a fine line and because of that i think he knew exactly what his actions were and by that time the battle lines were drawn so he chose the pirates vs sony in his stance (as evident by his rap)

Hes still a young kid, he made some mistakes handling his talents, hopefully now that he works for one of the biggest corporations on earth and hes doing something with a boss and such his talent can be utilized in a much more productive way.


You do know he made it so his firmware did not allow piracy right? Other hackers altered his firmware or created their own. So again how is he at fault for others crimes? if you are going to blame him for supplying tools you better start bblaming sony and pc makers for also supplying the same tools.

I didnt say it was his fault. If you would stop and read my post before going on your tirade against anyone who posts an opinion opposite of yours you would have seen that I said i dont think his intent was to pirate games. I simply said i feel like he knew once his homebrew hit it would be CAPABLE of pirating games, at that point i feel he could have taken a stance more rigidly and even pulled access to it or addressed it sincerely in his blog once he found people doing it.

Take a deep breath and stop with the insane analogies. Its like youre part of the inquisition or something. Im allowed to personally find someone annoying/distateful/insincere which is all my post staed. never did i even use the word BLAME or GUILTY or FAULT. I simply said i can tell a punk from a mile away, this kids a punk. Its easy to see, hes young is talented and had a chip on his shoulder. Not a big deal. Most kids are punks, especially on the internet...on forums...like these.......




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thranx on 28 June 2011
Kantor said:
thranx said:


on that same note sony should stop selling ps3's. without them supplying them to people, people would not be able to hack ps3 and then pirate games. look at sony enabling hackers and pirates, how dare they. Sony is hurting the industry with its enabling of piracy.

That's like saying it's the store founder's fault for founding the store, because if he hadn't, he wouldn't have been robbed.

You're also implying that Sony wanted this to happen, which is ridiculous.

I know it is. I completely agree its ridiculous. But its the same as blaming Geohot for it. Thats why I said it, to show just how ridiculous it is.