Anonymous VS Sony – There’s no such thing as bad publicity
Two days ago the Anonymous community announced actions would be taken against Sony’s corporate websites, following Sony’s decision to sue hacker George Hotz, who jailbroke the PS3.
Sony’s servers were down for a few hours two days ago, which Sony claimed was for “sporadic maintenance”, but was obviously the result of the attacks. As I type this, some urls affiliated to Sony have erratic behavior and are fairly slow.
Some gamers were also impacted, as they couldn’t connect to the PSN (and therefore, couldn’t play online) for a few hours during the attacks. Although these users are “collateral damage”, and nobody was physically harmed, many PS3 owners started questioning the true goal of the attacks. If the goal is to protect the users, then why have an attack that impacts them the most?
In parallel, another branch of Anonymous started an operation named SonyRecon, aiming at gathering information about Sony’s officials. A few websites reported that some Anons suggested to use these Sony reps’ family information to “bully” them, prank-call them, or post personal information on some awkward sites… That kind of action was quickly thumbed down by many hackers including KaKaRoTo, but the people who initiated the SonyRecon project confirmed that the goal of this operation is only to gather publicly available information on Sony’s representatives, in the hope to get some incriminating information that could help geohot in the lawsuit.
This feels weird. The ideals behind Anonymous seem perfectly fine to me. Protecting Free Speech is a very noble goal, but it seems that the very basic idea of this community (anybody can initiate something and do anything they think is relevant) is what discredits them a lot here (I doubt the initial goal was to threaten some families, or to prevent gamers from using their systems). Even though the idea of hacktivism to make our voice heard sounds like a cool idea, their irc channel is crippled with script kiddies who just want to mess with the system…
And yet, it doesn’t make the message behind this meaningless. Anonymous say they are fighting against the small and big injustices in this world, and the result is extremely democratic: anybody can choose an action, and the result of the action will directly depend on the number of people following. In other words, since the Sony websites are being impacted, it means enough people care about this lawsuit to make a difference, and to make the message meaningful. Finally even if you like this action or not, there is no such thing as bad publicity, it means a few major newspapers are looking at this lawsuit and talk about it, which is the main point IMO.
People interested in learning more about #opSony will find the information on their irc channel. Although I made my position clear on this lawsuit, I’m not sure if such hacktivism is good or bad. You’re all old enough to take the decision by yourselves, if you want to join this Anonymous raid.
By the way, you can hate Anonymous, hate Geohot, or hate Sony or the DMCA…but whatever you do, pick a side and do not think this has nothing to do with you.
wow… this ***’s gettin serious, huh?
yea wat if we didnt play for a year
they need to let us back on there gays
Im on Sony’s side, as per usual.
Alright, so I read another article that details it further. From what I understand, all this is over the removal of the OtherOS option?
Wow, really? OtherOS was never originally included with the PS3 system, when they added OtherOS in a firmware update, they included in the ToS that by downloading and installing this firmware update, people accepted that future updates could remove or tweak/adjust features and content on the system.
It’s not only about OtherOS. OtherOS is an example. If Sony wins this lawsuit, it sets a precedent, that companies can sell you a service, and remove it whenever they want without any penalty for them.
It also gives a bad example for mankind, that a company preventing the freedom of information, and crushing technical curiosity, is right in the eyes of the law.
Curiosity is the source of mankind’s progress. Sharing information is what makes us human. Companies that try to prevent the sharing of knowledge should not be winning.
What Sony does is probably Legal, that doesn’t mean it’s right.
All the knowledge I got regarding computers, I got it for free. My teachers in Engineering school where researchers, the type of people who would look into a console to see how it works, and then explain it to their students. The type of people who would publish free information on how to secure a system, and then would see companies use this free information in order to create a locked system such as the PS3.
Sony is very happy to hire engineers that know how to work on the IBM processors. What if everything in computer science was closed? They wouldn’t find a single person able to work on their hardware. It is unfair that they rely on the information, result of dozens of years of shared knowledge in the field of computer science, the work of thousands of people over the years, and then prevent a guy from sharing the same type of knowledge.
Note that it doesn’t mean that I think DDoSing them is the solution though.
Well, I was talking about the situation from a legal standpoint, not through a subjective standpoint from a consumer. Nonetheless, the comments on the article I read gave me the wrong idea that the whole thing started because of the removal of OtherOS. Trusting your word, I see I was wrong, sorry about that.
I just don’t agree with the revealing of Sony people’s personal information, full name, age, address, phone number, marital status, whether they have children or not, etc… And DDoSing the Playstation sites and PSN itself, besides, isn’t a DDoS Attack illegal in most countries around the world? Anyway, I think Anon went way too far with this, and I will not support them.
I personally support the hacking scene and Sony both, but I lean towards Sony more, maybe it’s because Im just a kid (14-yrs-old) owning many Sony products, and seeing how they work (without all the hacks) has amazed me already (Except of course, the PSP, they lock that thing down too much). Also I’d rather PSN doesn’t get shut down… I don’t want to get a 360.
Just my opinion, though.
sony tracked isp details from viewers of videos on you tube and also requested and got details of paypal customers. not acceptable behavour were will it end, it gives the green light of every company to follow suit. you buy a product its yours to do with as you please, the other os feature yes has a point customers bought ps3 to run linux in some cases then are told down the line that they can no longer have this option and to remove it or be banned. you cannot change the goalposts. sony will lose, there stocks are going down and once the protesting at stores starts even more headache for shareholders.
respect to annonymous glad your out there watching the general publics backs.
a pity they didnt sort the banks before they got the economy in the state its in know.
If you’re with Sony “per usual,” then what the *** are you doing on this blog? Look around. On this blog we oppose Sony’s playground-bully tactics. I would understand if you were just taken aback by Anonymous’ extreme measures, but if you’re someone who enjoys being told by Sony that the console you paid $600-$300 for still belongs to them, who doesn’t give a *** if his right to privacy is stepped over by some corporation, then you do not belong on this site. In fact, you do not belong on a medium of FREE EXPRESSION like the Internet.
Haha, as I said, I support both the hacking scene and Sony, I don’t usually take sides, but in the SonyVSUser case Im leaning towards Sony. After Anon’s actions, I can’t help but feel the hacking scene’s sense of entitlement, of course this is just Anon, but something this big is pretty much representing the PSP/PS3 Hacking scene on the whole. A bunch of hackers, people who are supposed to represent the scene – revealing personal information of Sony people, from Employees to CEOs, DDoSing several Sony websites and the Playstation Network itself, etc.
It’s probably due to the fact that all this *** Sony does that seems to happen to others, doesn’t happen to me, Im not the type to complain about these things. If it DOES happen to me. I just accept it for what it is and do my best to enjoy what is given to me.
I go on say, Battlefield BC2, I play a few rounds, have fun and switch the console off. That’s what I do. No I don’t try to download movies off PSN, I don’t have an issue with DRMs, copyright protection (Except in the case of Youtube), Digital Watermarking, ability to run homebrews on the PS3, etc.
@Rodin: that’s a bit harsh 🙂
I don’t expect all my readers to share my view, and I’m happy to see that MitMakis has an argumented opinion on the subject, did some research on it, and can see that there is no black or white in this issue. This is exactly the kind of people I’m happy to discuss with 🙂
… sam?
they used sam?
wait a sec…
this may be not the work of normal hackers!
what if a sony’s enemy (microsoft, nintendo… the list goes on) is using hackers with the cover of an “anonimous group” to attack sony?
maybe i have this kind of mind from too much armored core gameplay but this sure looks suspicious and i am not sure theese hackers are actually true.
anyway if all this is the real performing of anonymous…
(sarcastic mode on) WAY TO GO! (sarcastic mode off)
you just threw a whole barrel of *** on geohot and demonstrated that sony was right for that.
i agree with anonymous that sony has gone too far, but anonymous too overdid it!
they’re not overdoing it…or not yet as I would say because nobody was PHYSICALLY hurt
Yeah, nobody has been PHYSICALLY hurt… YET. Anonymous’ tactics imply a very high risk to certain Sony’s employees, so you can expect some dangerous actions until the day somebody gets hurt.
You’re making a dangerous confusion between hackers and cheaters, you should probably read a bit more on the subject.
I don’t mind people having a different opinion than mine, but I expect my readers to know what they are talking about before they post.
you got a point.. they must thank sony for free online play over xbox live.. I wonder why is that. im on Sony’s side in this situation. because im having a ps3 and worried from being not able to play online 🙁
im on geohot side its not like what he did wrong besides crashing psn but their network mostly crashes at least twice a month or once a month and geo bought the ps3 so techinally its his so he can jail break it but if he gets free games then ya i dont see anything wrong with crashing psn
*** is that? So I can’t get on mw2 online? =\ imma see
I never did use sony’s online so i am 100% on the side of Anonymous.
Their methods are questionable but their idea is noble.
^ this
Way to go Anon. Crash and burn all sony sites. Yes that includes the PSN network. I know im a scumbag and a POS, but i real dont care what others think.Sony got all worked up over Geo because he got bored and started to mess with the PS3. The real reason is because the PS3 was suppose to be “hackproof”, and Geo proved them wrong. Sony is just mad that everytime they thought they fixed the problem someone found new ways to mod PS3. Geo is just getting the hammer because Sony got showed up again.
What Sony is trying to do is get “even” with the 21 year old “punk” that did the “impossible”. An “unhackable” console was released in 2007 and four years after its release, it was indeed hacked by George Hotz, a 21 year old computer whiz from New Jersey. Even I have to admit that I would be embarrassed if a three year old was able to do my Advanced Calculus homework. Sony is practically trying to prove to us all that even though we paid good money for our systems, that they are still owned by Sony (of Japan). Any person who has logged into the PSN and read over the agreement would be able to see that in the fine print. However, this is like saying that you can’t put a couch in your kitchen because the architects and interior designers of said house didn’t plan on it being in there. I think that if people choose to run homebrew (legally) on their purchased equipment, they are within their rights to do so. That being said, if Sony so chooses to disagree, they are also within their rights to ban someone from the Playstation Network (something that they do still maintain and own). If you follow Anonymous’ actions in the past, you will see that they have always fought for the morally just reason whether you choose to believe so or not. Notice also that they do not attack the press or any of your blogs when something is negatively said about them: their goal is freedom of speech throughout the internet and obviously are not biased by race, age or gender. It’s unfortunate for all of those who have to suffer a few hours of not being able to play an online game, but if you look at the greater cause you may start to realize that there could be more to life than just that. Maybe you were putting aside homework, maybe you’re a friendship or relationship is failing or maybe you have let yourself go and need to do physical activity. Whatever the cause people, like Anonymous, we need to practice the one thing that sets us apart from all other animals and stand up for what we truly believe in, or be trampled and left in the dust by those of us who do.
Anonymous FTW!
Just to clear this up, cause i know its coming from someone. I am not a teenage boy, playing on my parents computer. I happen to be a married 32 yr man with two childern. Only reason I wrote that is because , every other site posting info on Sony vs. Anon is filled with ple that keep saying thing. Oh your opinion is different then mine, so im going to call you *** or tell you to die. I think most of you know what im talking about. Thanks for posting info and letting my opinon be heard.
Very well put Ratmasa.
Why hasnt sony gone after Dark_Alex (psp hacker) . He did (and is still doing) the same thing Geohot did. Yet sony hasnt taking legal action against him.
Like I said before, this lawsuit is more than likely a battle of egos that Sony has already lost, as I highly doubt they are after Hotzs’ Swiss Bank Account. The PSP wasn’t claimed to be unhackable, and therefore the lawsuit currently at hand (if won) may be a gateway for them to start pressing the other hackers (such as the forementionedDark_Alex).
from what I see is sony just got *** off, and I have to say that what geohotz did is over the line.
What dark_alex and other hacker did before this can still be solved with a firmware update. But “kirk keys”….. I’m not sure if a firmware update could fix it. what i know is now there are alot of signed (pirated) commercial games floating around and playable on an official firmware consoles.
What if you’re one of the worker making the games that got pirated. before there is 2 side of the coin, 1 side playing pirated version, the other using unhackable console buying (feeding) you for your hard work. And now both of the sides can use your hard work for free, time for an early retirement.
And myself as a non piracy PSP user can feel the impact right away, game release just suddenly got choked. All the good games that started coming on 2010 (about the time when there is no piracy update on new firmware) just get halted. Well, cant blame the game developer on this one, If I were them, I would also shitting my pants right now.
I dont like the idea of this “Anonymous” group…its just affecting general customers more than the company.I mean, the company is going to have to do something about it, and im sure they will.
Hackers like GeoHot and fail0verflow didnt do anything that affected the casual gmers, they just opened the security from curiosity.(ofcourse, geohot released the keys,which i didnt think was a good idea) I think that this “Anonymous” group is slightly selfish, in the way that they dont care about the other gamers,and are shutting the sony networks down.(although I think that the video is pretty awesome!)
i’m on geohot’s side and i think that anonymous is only doing harm to him…
so basically ithe current situation is…
sony vs geohot and anonymous
anonymous helping geohot (not with right methods and so harming him)
geohot trying to win this lawsuit who is getting in a even worse situation because of anonymous sticking theyr nose.
In the court of law, it will show that there is no way to directly link Hotz with Anonymous. Also, if Sony claims that there is and are proven wrong once again, it will only make Sony lose their viability to make accurate claims. Therefore, I bet they won’t even try as I believe they would like to save face after their multiple other blunders in the case thus far. In essence, the attacks by Anonymous may end up helping Hotz in the end.
wait a minute… if geohot was mentioned in the video,then… would it be viable?
The message this group may have had (though I never sided with them and do love Sony) is now completely flipped on its head. Debate the company, fine. Attacking people on a personal level… way too, too far. On top of that to find something that guy can use in court against them!?!? Their means of getting this information will be illegal so what good will it do? Plus they are really not helping this Geohot guy. Doing this stuff in his name only gives the guy a bad face. And on the internet grapevine could even be perceived as him backing it ):
This situation is getting a bit scary.
From what Sony showed, this can’t be good for anyone. 1) lawsuit won’t drop 2) another lawsuit will go against this group, and will succeed.
I do think choosing a side is not needed. I do support Sony, as they try to make profit, which is the basic of democracy. However, information should be free and open, and services cannot be revoked w/o a reason. Hacking/cracking is not the way to give the mainstream user this possibility. However if you buy hard- and software, you should own it and be able to do with it whatever you like.
Nevertheless, I do support this group as it will give a voice against a company, however you never go personal. (which is happening as you described)
I believe you’re confusing capitalism for a democracy…
Look at that video, what a bunch of pretentious little nerds. I’m on Geohotz side but anonymous is mainly a bunch of kids who want to be apart of something. A lot of people love the feeling of having power over someone and that’s exactly what this group indulges in. Sure sometimes they look like they’re for justice, other times they feel their time needs to be spent ruining twelve year old girl’s lives.
I agree with @svenn
I for one am on nobodies “side”, but it does my heart good to see someone giving Sony a hard time and actually having a little success, whether thier methods are legal or not i don’t really care, i just hope they stick it to Sony good.
For me this thing with Geohotz is just the straw that broke the camels back, for years Sony has been pushing thier corporate weight around bullying and walking over anyone they please….. yeah they released a good brand “Playstation” but THEY STOLE THE TECHNOLOGY FROM NINTENDO in the first place, the playstation was to be a CD drive upgrade for the SNES until they tried to bully Nintendo who smartly backed out of the deal(they basically would have been handing thier brand over to Sony if Sony got thier way)………..
So yeah Sony has been doing whatever they please for way too long, they don’t care about thier customers, they don’t care about the small developer, and they do not give a *** about the video game industry, that i can assure you, they care only about green paper with faces on it.
The fact that Sony thinks they can so openly abuse the American legal system(and it seems to be working) in this case against GeoHotz just really makes my blood boil for some reason and i really wanna see the bastards go down in flames, because for me this is it for sony…. in my mind the scumbags don’t even exist any more and will never again recieve another penny of my money.
OMFG!
How far are they going to take this? Why did anonymous made SONY’S problems MINE?
Understood, that sony is EVIL, GREEDY company that will do anything for money, but why would anonymous do this?
The anonymous have no justice.
Because they are likely very young and dont stop to consider the effects of thier action, political hacker groups like anon usually don’t have a single member over the age of 20, so they’re pretty much angry teenagers, trying to right a wrong, and maybe going about it the wrong way……. i commend them for taking action though, and if i were younger I would be right there with them doing whatever i could to *** off sony
Sony are just getting what’s due them. If you’re on this site, then you shouldn’t be whining, because this shouldn’t affect you in any way. If you’re here, it’s likely you hacked your console. WHICH MEANS YOU SHOULD NOT BE GETTING ON PSN!! Your PS3/PSP is yours. PSN is Sony’s. You mod your console, you forfeit your right to PSN and the stuff that comes with updates. (Which is nothing compared to what can be done with homebrew anyway.)
If you guys want to help them send attacks to this ip address.
63.84.59.40
🙂
You know DDoS attacking is illegal?
In this case it’s called civil disobedience.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_civil_disobedience
Not that I would suggest anyone to target an IP just because a random comment says to do so. In the case of this action, things are loosely coordinated on a few IRC channels that are well known, this is where people should go if they are interested in participating.
I’m not even sure how they would go about proving an intentional DDos attack, since the attack itself is little more than visiting a website over and over and over and over and over again………. you can DDos a website just by continually hitting refresh on your browser, DDos attacks DO happen by accident all the time….. like when we accidentily DDosed wololo when TN-Hen was about to be released…… hey it happens…. thems the ropes.
Hmmmmmmm….. “Yes your honor i simply fell asleep with my browser on the playstation store page, little did i know my mouse button was stuck and the cursor was hovered over the refresh button….. OOPS”
good news, for me at east. the playstation store now seems to be working. 😀
http://townsend.com/en/Knowledge_Center/Newsroom/No_Longer_Representing_Sony_Against_George_Hotz.aspx
This is very sad news.
Attacking is dumb, they will never get something good out of this.
It’s sad, as I have said before some “hackers” just wanna pick fights.
The behavior of that anonymous is not normal. He is destroying something instead of helping. Stealing personal information from others and putting it in a website where they will be bullied is purely inhuman. What if the same thing happen to them? What will they feel?
we will not know untill we see the outcome.
They have their own way.
obviously, if sony gets what they want. geohot would be treated in a more inhuman way
what anon did was wrong imo, he approached it in a very hostile way, but yeah the cause was very noble. i agree with the fact that we own the system and its contents so its ours to salvage and share, sharing the keys was like sharing his own ps3 in a way, if thats illegal then half the country is going to jail really, the hackers arent the bad guys, rather its the cheaters as wololo said. the people who use knowledge for personal gains that result in the harm of others, these people are the real criminals
It is curious like No one messes with Nintendo.
yeah…how come things like this never happened with their consoles XD
This is wat I call a group, they’d take VISA once as well.
They’re using as much as possible people who can hack it, so their group has always different members. Then you see that it was just a kid who hacked the systems, but in fact there’s a big group behind it. They just take some ‘normal’ people (like us) and let them do the job. Anonymous is just a pseudonym to convince the people to help them. There’s a big chance that Sony will go down a few more times I think, they won’t give up. But you have to know that they just can attack servers to make them offline, they can’t really adjust things to it.
I’m curious what will happen now. ^^
Good on you Anon. I personally would never do what you do for the whole “don’t want to get arrested” thing, but keep on doin’ work!
Sony has been such a dickbag lately, we need to tell them what’s what imo.
I hope that Anonymous help Geohot with this case.
I’m against what Sony is doing, do I think what geohot did was wrong no, what certain people are doing with that information it yes. It’s all in someones personal views.
I believe in Anonymous motives the key words in that video are” interrupt free flow of information” that’s it pure an simple. And yes there is collateral damage it happens but at this collateral damage isn’t the reason for innocent lives to be lost or environmental, but most are caught up in their own little world and would rather complain because they can’t “play” when there is definitely a bigger picture here.
“It takes a revolution to make a solution.”- bob marley
Get at’em anonymous!!
If you go out and buy a video game you don’t own the contents of the disc. If you go out and buy hardware just because you spent $300 on it doesn’t mean you own the service. And surprise surprise you dont own the psn service so modifying the software should get you banned. Though I don’t agree with sony suing geohot and taking away linux. I think people have a false sense of entitlement to everything. Just look at comments people make here “I don’t use PSN so I don’t care if legitimate customers who purchase games from it can’t access it.” People are always for hacking without even thinking about the ramifications it could have. Just look at cheaters, yeah there were cheaters before but now it’s ten times worse. There needs to be some kind of balance between hackers and people trying to steal and ruin everyone’s experience.
sorry for the double post but it still baffle’s my mind that geohot didn’t just release the keys anonymously. FOr hackers that are supposed to e so smart they do a lot of stupid ***.
I think you don’t get the point. Geohot believes that not being allowed to do what he did is a flaw of the legal system, an injustice. So he is standing for his rights.
Releasing anonymously would have been acknowledging that what he does is illegal. That would be exactly the opposite of the message he’s trying to convey.
Wow, CREEPY video..lol!, i wouldnt like to get on their bad side
Stupid nerdz messing with my PS3 playing time. Geohotz can fry in the electric chair for all I care. He’s just another kid whining–“I should be able to do whatever I want…so there. Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah.” My advice to him and his computer-nerd posse: don’t bend over to pick up the soap! hehe.
When I read comments like yours I realize that PS3 Gamers are really mature, while hackers are just kids. Thanks for enlightening me, your opinion really matters.
I couldn’t read all the posts, but have come to one conclusion. Dealing with the OtherOS option. If you chose to keep this option you would be banned from PSN only and of course from anymore updates. Now yes that sucks, but if you want to play on their servers you kind of need to play by their rules. All that is going to come out of this lawsuit is PSN is no longer going to be free for users. I hate to see that outcome, but it’s bound to happen. We bought the PS3 yes it’s ours to do with what we want. They own the servers and if we want to connect to them we need to accept their guild lines. If you look at it in a different light you will see this same scenario throughout time. I own my body and can walk down the road and swing my arms as much as I want to. If you walk near me and I hit you it is my fault for invading your personal space. We have the right to hack and reverse engineer the PS3 all we want. We just can’t get onto their servers once we have.