George Hotz speaks out in light of flee allegations
- Posted March 24th, 2011 at 15:01 EDT by Mike Harradence
- 16 Comments
Notorious PlayStation 3 hacker George “Geohot” Hotz has laughed off claims that he’s packed his bags and fled to South America in an effort to evade Sony’s lawyers.
While acknowledging that he is indeed not presently in his native North America, Hotz noted on his blog that his recent excursion to South America was planned months ago as part of a spring vacation.
"Apparently, I have fled the country. ROFL," said Hotz. "Factually, it's true I'm in South America, on a vacation I've had planned and paid for since November. I mean, it is spring break; hacking isn't my life.”
"Rest assured that not a dime of legal defence money would ever go toward something like this. And of course [Kilpatrick Townsend & Stockton - Sony's choice of legal firm on this matter] loves the idea of painting me as an international fugitive.”
"I have been in contact with my lawyers almost every day," Hotz added. "I would not let the case suffer.
"That said, I also won't let this ridiculous lawsuit run my life either. Then the fearmongerers win."
Hotz went on to say in jest that he plans on returning to North America as Sony’s Xperia Play is “hard to come by” where he's currently staying.
Sony lawyers yesterday accused Hotz of refusing to comply with court orders, declaring, “Hotz's attempts to dodge this Court's authority raise very serious questions.”
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boristhespie
- 12:04pm EDT - March 24th, 2011
- 3
Sony are playing a propaganda game here which in itself is insidious and denudes their case.
I don't know squat about this guy nor about what's really gone on, neither does Sony (Hence why they are fishing for evidence to back up their CIVIL suit) and by extension neither do you.
The ill-informed vitriol and bile thrown at this guy by people without a clue is pathetically childish.
I have no idea about what this guy is like other than a couple of mick-take posts and naff rap but what I do know is that Sony has used it's financial power to steamroll a judge into undermining the rights of many citizens which could affect all of us regardless of whether you think you've done anything wrong or not.
The right to identify people who may even have just looked at a video is scary.
Infact, the way a corporate giant such as Sony have gotten the judge to order handovers of wide ranging information in what is a CIVIL suit and NOT a criminal case without any shred of evidence nor without any recourse to the defendant to access their own information, is very scary and reminiscent of something I'd expect in a totalitarian country like Russian, any Middle Eastern country or China.
These events are setting presidents which will affect the way the INTERNET is governed and set out how little power you are allowed to have both within the sphere of the INTERNET or over your own belongings.
Personally, as someone who has bought and owned machines from the original Atari (in the 70's), Zx80/81, numerouse ZX Spectrums, Commodores 64, Amiga, BBC, Acrorns, through to PC's Smartphones, Ipods, Xbox, Playstation 1&2, Gameboys, PS3, Xb360's, all of which I still own, and paid for them all including all my games, I wont take any squat from anyone implying that somehow I don't actually own any of it.
Corporate rights to make money is all fine and well but Corporate greed does not trump my rights.
Sony et al should just be happy that I have through personal spending and through my business provided them with hundreds of thousands of pounds of cash sales.
In addition I have been a creator of intellectual media properties for 20 years, so I also know a thing or two about misappropriation of my hard work and it's affect on my baseline. This is sod all to do with this.
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JustinPinter
- 2:33pm EDT - March 24th, 2011
- 5
@ TheStory
Lol. Yeah, we are looking into a solution for getting rid of these spam bots.
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TekkenLord
- 3:07pm EDT - March 24th, 2011
- 6
should he have told his lawyers or sony lawyers that he is leaving the country for a vacation.
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terminator12259
- 4:00pm EDT - March 24th, 2011
- 7
F&*^ you George, i hope Sony completely destroys you in court and takes everything you own, its people like you who make gaming worse for the rest of us
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Ryuuchi10
- 4:25pm EDT - March 24th, 2011
- 9
As much to everyone who hate/dislike Sony and love another console, they're laughing off their way playing a game using an HD DVD. While we're sitting here contemplating to what's going to happen next for Sony's video game system. I'd be disappointed if there were more added security features just because of this incident. However, no matter how anyone's looking at this sitaution, one way or the other, Sony is gonna come up with something to prevent hackers alike who are destroying the system and the fun out of everyone else who's not even a hacker whatsoever.
It's great that everyone's hacking the sytem freely and pirating all those games but you have to keep in mind that something like that doesn't benefit as much as being truthfully a loyal customer to something you like, such as Sony and their products and softwares. I'm gonna keep it real while you folks do something dirty with your hands.
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Sufi
- 4:41pm EDT - March 24th, 2011
- 10
I like how he says that the donation money won't go to the vacation but fact of the matter is, it will and has...why? Because he wouldn't be taking no damn vacation when he had all that loan on him. It's called, LOGIC. I'm sure he knows a thing or two about it...albiet in a different form, heh.
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1solidsnake |
solid1snake67- 5:39pm EDT - March 24th, 2011
- 11
hes kind of a hypocrit, he made me fear that someone hacked my ps3, so he's dumb. he's scurred right now and thats why he left u.s.a.
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darthrazorback
- 7:25pm EDT - March 24th, 2011
- 12
FYI, a friend was recently contacted by Sony to work on a "social media public relations" campaign, where he would be tasked with spreading Sony's message through social media and fan sites. They didn't tell him what he had to do, since he had to accept the job and sign an NDA, but he felt pretty confident it was posting fake support messages for Sony's site and attack GeoHot.
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SergeantR7
- 12:17pm EDT - March 25th, 2011
- 14
The fact people think he will go to jail for this is reason enough that I'm not taking sides but the very fact that this guy can't go on a Goddamn vacation without being harrassed by sony and it's "loyal fans" is pretty sad.
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blackmetal
- 11:25pm EDT - March 28th, 2011
- 15
I don't really want to take any sides on this matter, but I personally don't see anything wrong with what he did to his PS3. Hacking a system you bought with your own money isn't exactly a crime. It isn't a crime to renovate your house is it? In fact, I appluad the ingenuity of people out there who think outside of the box to drive innovation. If his 'jailbreak' code opens the system up for pirating, then pirating is the crime.
On Sony's side, they'll spend millions of wasted dollars to prove a point and make an example of him. The financial sectors don't have the same view at all. If say Bank of America, Nova Scotia, Montreal, etc had an issue that came out, they'd keep it quiet and also keep millions. If contacted by the media they'd deny there was any problem at all. In that aspect I respect Sony.
If I was Sony I would instead take those millions and invest them back into the company as the shares took quite a hit from the earthquake. I guess you have to pick your battles, and it's as much a political choice as it is a financial one.
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Beasley2K
- 3:07pm EDT - March 29th, 2011
- 16
@3 You clearly do no know what you're talking about. What you said was a load of gibberish and you have not understood this case correctly.
@14 He committed a criminal offense that's affects both "Sony and its loyal fans". They can harass him all they like.
@15 No-one has a problem with him hacking the PS3; it's the fact that he released the keys to the public, which in turn enables anyone to pirate PlayStation software. That is his crime, and that is why he is disliked. Except, of course, by the dishonest thieves that are in fact using the keys for piracy.
This will permanently ban this user and delete all associated comments. This action is irreversible, are you SURE you want to do this?!
