February's Hacker News

Welcome back lockBoxx fans for another exciting update in HACKER NEWS!! First, I want to talk about the PS3 hack. Jail-breaking a PS3 is completely software based, and relatively easy, although since this is an older exploit you will need firmware 3.55 or earlier. But be careful, because Sony recently started hunting down violators of its "service terms and agreements" on it's Play Station Network (even those connecting through a proxy)! If that's not bad enough, Sony is also suing GeoHotz and other people it finds distributing its secret signing keys (NOTE: I am not giving any direct information on how to perform this hack, I am merely reporting the news). Although, it is this reporter's opinion that Sony's legal actions will fail, as did the Apple iPhone case, resulting in new 'jail-breaking' laws. The other story I wanted to touch on, is the 'PlentyofFish' hack. This is a really weird one, and goes out to all my security researcher / pen tester friends. There seems to be all kinds of blackmailing and slander going back and forth between Markus Frind (CEO of PlentyofFish) and Chris Russo (hacker behind full disclosure). Markus published his initial reaction to the hacking, to his PoF blog. Chris also passed e-mails on to legitimate news sources, detailing his side of the story, but both stories conflict claiming blackmail of the other party. So this is certainly a shady story, with a lot of end users at risk and money to be had. Whoever you think is in the right (if anyone . . .), there is still a lesson to be learned here. If you are hacking or researching for anyone, always make sure you have permissions FIRST, and a contract!