Judge allows Sony to get IP of anyone who has visited Geohot site.

[Smooth Operator]

WTF, Sony is a private bloody firm not a law enforcement agency, and they just sold them critical information of Geohot?!
In what universe is this even remotely legal...

 

[Traun]

At this point people might be braking the PS3 just to see how far Sony can go.

 

[Bon_Clay]

What in the fuck? How can people think this is okay? Learn something about the world people, what gives them the right to track what any citizen does on the internet?

What about people who didn't download any cracks, or don't own a PS3? How are they relevant to this case. It doesn't matter what they think they need them for, or what other people say about the amount of information they are getting. They shouldn't have the right to get it, that's the end of it.

People are innocent until proven guilty, and if there is no reasonable suspicion of them committing a crime, then there should be absolutely no case where their privacy is invaded to any degree. Even if Sony has to lose the case, its better that than one person unfairly having their rights taken away. Citizens' rights come before their terms of service or ability to enforce them.

As for the first amendment, it counts under freedom of speech basically. If people get to snoop in on what you're reading, that will affect what you read and what you say.

Fuck sony, I'm glad I never bought a PS3 and I never will.

 

[Lazier Than Thou]

I'm going to post the text of the first amendment. You're going to tell me exactly where it says anything about privacy.

Oh, sorry, I was trying to be sarcastic. That thing is more along the lines of the IV amendment.

It's cool.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

You win the internet, for being the first person in so very long to actually bother looking up anything in the constitution before arguing over it

Anyway, I'm with Sony on this one. It must be a real prick to have so many people screwing with the service you worked so hard on, and now they're in a position to work against those people. It's unlikely that this data will ever be used - and it would be difficult to enforce whatever they might want do to, anyway - but in principle, I'm glad they have it.

Thank you. I do believe that is my first time winning an internet. I'd like to thank Wikipedia for making this possible and the Founders of the United States of America for the source material. Couldn't have done it without them.

I'm not going to defend Sony, but precisely how does this skirt the First Amendment?

I don't speak legalese, but the gist of what the EFF said is that it violates several privacy related sections.

Then you'd be looking at the Fourth Amendment.

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

I bolded the important bit. I don't think it's unreasonable for Sony to acquire the IP addresses of the people that may have disturbed their intellectual property.

Personally, I believe that people should be able to do with their property what they will. That includes people hacking into their PS3s, but also includes Sony banning any such person from then using their servers for the purposes of playing games.

 

[RowdyRodimus]

Man, I think I'll go get a new PSP to reward SONY a bit for this. It's time people learned that just because you CAN do something like this doesn't mean you SHOULD do it.

 

[migo]

I hope LG spanks Sony badly, and follows them all around Europe getting a prohibition of sale in every country, followed up by having to pay LG for each of the 41 million PS3s they sold using LG's IP that they tried to sue LG for using. And yes, the way they're dealing with the jailbreak situation is exactly why I hope LG owns them.

 

[Trolldor]

I'm not going to defend Sony, but precisely how does this skirt the First Amendment?

Breaking of privacy I assume.

This isn't the case at least. They have the rights to disclose this information.

Yet, I can't help but say this. "Go, go, go, GO! Sony Entertainment!". They've had it coming.

I'm going to post the text of the first amendment. You're going to tell me exactly where it says anything about privacy.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Well, to be fair it does impinge on free speech if the legal system is going to allow users to be punished for visiting a website.

 

[Tanis]

I bolded the important bit. I don't think it's unreasonable for Sony to acquire the IP addresses of the people that may have disturbed their intellectual property.

You may be a racist.

I have no proof, but because I saw you post a picture that 'looked not too PC to me' I can slander you and call you a racist?
Maybe tell the local judicial types to put you in some kind of record, just in case.

Because, you never, know if/when 'this one guy on the internet' may beat up a non-*insert skin color here* and we need to add another 5-10 years for it being a hate crime and all.


Admittedly, I'm going to extremes, but then again...so is Sony.


If I want to visit a bondage site to jerk to pictures of a midget having rough sex with a hermaphrodite dressed in a Catholic school girl outfit...that's my right.
It may be weird (and REALLY disgusting) but I should be able to do that without worrying about Sony or The Westbro Baptist Church ordering a court to find out who I am, just so they can show they have some kind of authority.

TL;DR?
Sony, and most of the gaming/music/movie/ect industry as a whole, needs to STOP treating consumers as guilty criminals first.

Are people pirating games, music, movies, ect? Sure...duh!

Is treating LEGITIMATE (IE: Lawful) buyers like criminals going to stop it?
NO!
Is treating LEGITIMATE (IE: Lawful) buyers like criminals going to increase it?
PROBABLY!
Is treating LEGITIMATE (IE: Lawful) buyers like legitimate buyers/consumers going to help/save the industry?
YES!

 

[shadow skill]

Does anyone actually trust Sony not to do bad things with the data, or handle it properly?

 

[Aeshi]

So can they just ban anyone whose visited it? I hope so.

 

[Aeshi]

Because god forbid Sony even try and stop hackers from turning PSN into even more of a hackerfest?

 

[Neonit]

quick! everyone who hasnt done anything, go on that site! lets send them on wild goose chase XD

 

[Aeshi]

You want to stop hackers? Here's an idea: spend more time coding a new anti-cheat system into a system update, and spend less time pissing off absolutely everybody in court. I don't even own a damn PS3 and Sony has still managed to get me all riled up.

Bit hard to design an anti-cheat system when the hackers can unban themselves and evade any form of punishment thanks to the rootkey.

 

[ImprovizoR]

Going to a website doesn't mean you did anything illegal. I dare them to try to sue people for visiting a website.

 

[Aeshi]

That's because there doesn't seem to be anything Sony can do "now or in the future" that doesn't ultimately just amount to :

"Bankrupt ourselves by making a new console"
or
"Go bankrupt because most people will probably just pirate their games now."

 

[fenrizz]

Dear Sony.

I am a long time customer, so hear me out.

When I was a little boy all I wanted for my birthday was a Playstation, and becasue my parents are really cool, they actually got me one.

I fell on love.
I played that little machine to death, literally.

And what did I do when my precious little machine died?
I went ahead and bought a new one.

Hell, I even got myself the PSOne.

When the Playstation 2 launched I was there, standing in line to be among the first to get it.
And I was not disappointed.

I played it for years, until it broke.
And you know what the first thing I did was?

You guessed it, I bought another one (Slim version).
And when that died I bought yet another one.

Then came the Playstation 3.
Overpriced, no backwards compability.
But I was willing to look past that, so I bought an expensive Playstation 3.

It served me well, right up until the warranty had ran out and it conveniently died by a Yellow Light of Death.

Did I stop to be bitter that my precious machine died?

Not even for a second.
I almost ran to the store to buy another one.

I am a loyal, long time customer.
I even bought not one, but two [url}http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MiniDisc]MiniDisc[/url] players.

And I am a proud owner of a PSP.

Every last piece of extra hardware (memory cards, extra controllers) have been official, Sony made products.

But enough is enough Sony.
I will not be treated like a criminal because I visited a site out of curiousity.

And besides, installing Linux on the PS3 was an advertised feature that you removed.
Did you really think that pissing the Linux crowd off was a brilliant move?

EDIT:

"Go bankrupt because most people will probably just pirate their games now."

If that was even remotely true, then PC gaming would be dead and buried by the turn of the century.