Geohot And Sony Lunching Like Chums

kjkg 37 Comments

The New Yorker isn’t my usual source for gaming news, but today that has changed. They are currently running a story on our beloved/respected/most hated hacker Geohot, otherwise known as George Hotz.

George has admitted that Sony invited him to come talk to their engineers and discuss his methods in hacking the “unhackable” machine.

The press piece is a pretty long piece written about someone who seems to have a fairly big ego. Most of it isn’t new to anyone following the case but skip to the last paragraph where he discusses his meeting in short with Sony.

The paper may have been hacked (but probably not). It currently has a date of the 7th May 2012 when it was written.

Source: New Yorker.

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Related stories from TSA

GeoHot Moves Onto Class Action Lawsuit, EULAs
Hacktavists Target Sony Employees
Anonymous Bring Down Sony, PSN
Geohot Contests PSN Account, Denies Knowledge Of SCEA

37 Comments

  1. Well done Sony, about time this happened.
    Hackers are often very clever but also poorly funded so it’s a very easy step to massively improve your system security by throwing a few quid and the promise not to prosecute in their direction.

  2. I would have no qualms about punching the smug, arrogant twat in the face.

    Repeatedly.

  3. Doesn’t this encourage hackers though? Successfully hack us and large corporations might employ you.

    • That’s not the reason many hackers do this but it is already very common practice in the UK. I used to work for a computer security firm and one of the guys on the penetration testing team was a former black hat hacker who got his start in the industry when a big online payment company that he had hacked brought him in as a consultant!

      • It’s a sad truth then. I beleive that people who work hard (and legitimately) should be rewarded. There is usually a right way of doing things. This guy, whilst clever, is clearly a cock.

      • Do they really get much of a career ladder opportunity after that though?

      • You get to say that you were network security consultant (or something to that effect) for a nationally/globally recognised firm, which does tend to look good on a cv if that is the line of work you are interested in.

  4. sony should have done this day one instead of declaring war on every hacker in the world by taking the little shit to court. would have saved themselves a 100+ million

    • Plus they could have fixed it instead of crippling Linux! *still bitter*

      • this reminds me of the film: catch me if you can.

  5. Not a real surprise, I mean where do you think Dark Alex disappeared to?

  6. Taking a leaf out of Apple’s book. :P When Comex continually found userland jailbreaks for iOS, Apple ended up hiring him! If someone hacks your console, hire them. They know how to fix the vulnerabilities and are usually first to find them. More so than current employees.

  7. thumb screws……yes. Well done Sony, its about time.

    • What are you congratulating Sony for?
      Read the article.

  8. Did any of you actually read the (whole) article?
    I admit Mr Hotz is arrogant and unlikeable, but has he actually done anything wrong?

    • Depends who you ask.

      If it wasn’t him, someone else would have done the same eventually. I think people just like a target.

      • I believe that what you do with your own iPhone/Playstation in your own time is up to you, as long as you aren’t using it for piracy or illegal activities. And George Hotz even added code to his hack to stop piracy.
        I’m sure there is more to the story than we (the public) are aware of, but as far as we know all he has done is find away for these devices to do what he wants.
        I do question publishing his code and his findings on the internet though. That is quite arrogant … but then he is young.

    • The punch is for the utter fucktardyness of his behaviour when visiting Sony, scoffing cereal as he enters.

      Wanker. Needs some manners punching in to his face.

    • Well due to him “challenging” himself, he caused Sony to retract the ability to use Linux and other OS, since they deemed that the best or only way to prevent further hacks/piracy. This affected and annoyed lots of other people who bought a console with the intention of using this facility.

      • Don’t fall into that trap.
        I cannot believe that the ONLY way to fix his hack was to completely disable OtherOS. I can easily believe that was the easiest/cheapest way though.

        Look at Microsoft’s Windows security updates. Hackers constantly find new ways in so they constantly patch it. They don’t disable whole features and then say “not our fault, blame them”

      • Not fallen into any trap mate, it was no doubt the easiest thing for them to do and their reasons were only to increase the protection for the majority of their consumers who want to game on a level playingfield. That doesn’t imply that it wasn’t the best or only fix for us (just Sony themselves), but its the action they took in response to GeoHotz’s hack since he used Linux to add his own program. I’m sure they could still make this feature possible, but they choose not to, to minimise the risk of this kind of thing happening again.

  9. “Over time, “hacker” acquired a more sinister meaning: someone who steals your credit cards, or crashes the electronic grid.”

    thats because main stream media dont care to differentiate between hacker and cracker.
    Hacker: someone who changes hardware/software to make it server their purpose
    Cracker: like a hacker but with criminal intent.

    • Strange, i always thought Cracker was a criminal psychologist.

      Damn Robbie Coltrane lying to me again.

      • Don’t feel bad. I thought it was something you could eat!

  10. Weird timeline… He was invited by Sony last May, as in May 2011, one month after the settlement?

    • He was invited to a sit down to reveal what he had done, but refused if I recall. That was just before court action was pursued I think.

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