Sony's initial announcement concerning its settlement with 21-year-old hacker George Hotz was light on details. The company, after pursuing legal recourse for nearly three months against Hotz for his work jailbreaking the PlayStation 3, was hesitant to say much. The most telling piece of early information was that Hotz agreed to a permanent injunction.
More details have come out regarding just what that court order means for Hotz now and in the future.
According to published court documents hosted by the EFF, the permanent injunction prevents Hotz from:
A. Engaging in any unauthorized access to any SONY PRODUCT under the law;
B. Engaging in any unauthorized access to any SONY PRODUCT under the terms of any SCEA or SCEA AFFILIATES' license agreement or terms of use applicable to that SONY PRODUCT, whether or not Hotz has accepted suchagreement or terms of use.
C. CIRCUMVENTING any of the TPMs or security in any SONY PRODUCT;
D. TRAFFICKING in any technology, product, service, device, component, or part thereof that, at the time of Hotz's trafficking, circumvents any of the TPMs or security in any SONY PRODUCT, including but not limited to the Ellptical Curve Signature Algorithm ("ECDSA") Keys, encryption and/or decryption keys, dePKG firmware decrypter program, Signing Tools, 3.55 Firmware Jailbreak, and/or any other technologies that enable unauthorized access to and/or copying of the PS3 System and/or enable compatibility of unauthorized copies of other copyrighted works with the PS3 System.
E. Distributing or posting any SCEA or SCEA Affiliates' confidential or proprietary information relating to any SONY PRODUCT;
F. Knowingly assisting or inducing others to engage in any of the conduct set forth in A-E above solely directed at any SONY PRODUCT or that otherwise constitutes contributory liabilty under the law.
Failure to comply with the order will result in a $10,000 fine per violation, capped out at $250,000. Those hoping that his subtly hinted desire to tinker with Sony's Xperia Play smartphone/gaming platform would bear fruit can take a breath.
Hotz's lawyer Yasha Heidari spoke with news site Ars Technica about the recent settlement. Though it would be misleading to dub either side a clear winner, Heidari was frank when it came to who lost: us.
"With the current IP laws and the DMCA, end users and consumers are the losers and will continue to be the losers until we pass some effective reforms on these subjects," Heidari told the site.
Corynne McSherry of the EFF, an online rights activist organization familiar with the Sony v. Hotz et al case, echoed Heidari's sentiments in a blog post and labeled the permanent injunction leveled against the hacker a "gag order."
"Hotz’s research remains public information," McSherry said. "The security flaws discovered by the researchers allow users to run Linux on their machines again — something Sony used to support but recently started trying to prevent. So all Sony has really accomplished is to silence one lonely researcher, and anger loyal customers."
MyCE reached out to Stewart Kellar, another attorney who represented Hotz during the legal proceedings, for his thoughts on the settlement and how it may affect the industry and the hacking scene. No comment was received at the time of this article's publication, but if Kellar offers one this post will be updated.
So, what's next for Hotz?
Based on his blog, the now-legally unencumbered hacker will stand and be counted among those joining in on Anonymous' boycott of all things Sony this weekend. He also says a new focus will be the ongoing class-action suit against Sony for removing OtherOS from the PlayStation 3.
He may be legally compelled to keep quiet on certain settlement details related to his now-dismissed case, but it's obvious he still has plenty to say.
