Saw this post about ICE (Immigration and Custom Enforcement) use of PS3s for the cracking of child pornographer’s passwords. I’m not even going to get into the debate surrounding that, because it isn’t really what I’m interested in here. What I am interested in is that ICE is using PS3s for this job. However, they’ll have to use the OLD PS3s for this job rather than the newest ones. Why? Because the new PS3s wont run Linux, which is what they’re running on these boxes to run their software.
But, I have to wonder what happens when ICE wants to add some new hardware, which they mention they want to do, and they realize the latest PS3s cannot have Linux installed? Will they go to Ebay and buy old PS3s? Will they get some special firware update from Sony (this is what I actually suspect) that re-enables the installation of Linux? Will they crack the devices like I’ve cracked my Wii and DS in order to homebrew for them? Unlikely, but I’d love to see them forced to resort to the mechanisms that us normal people have to to enable the functionality that should be built into our devices.
Or will they begin to realize that some of this is just double standards being placed on citizens versus corporations and government officials. Had some very disturbing conversations a couple of weeks ago in Washington D.C. with several people who said that my concern over things like the DMCA, copyright, encryption, and patents are nothing compared with the wide sweeping citizen-porking changes made in the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, which was made significantly worse with the US PATRIOT Act. Which, by the way seriously needs to have its name changed to the US FASCIST Act.
But, ICE will never ever have to face the cold hard reality that the rest of us hacker geeks face all the time. But they should. And the irony will likely be lost on all but those being jacked by the changes, me for one.