mclem said:
Zero tolerance for me. If you're building a device where security is that important, you do not *add* a component with a potential vulnerability in it. OtherOS should never have existed in the first place. Now it *does* exist, you can't take it away. It's on a completely different scale, but after Twilight Hack was introduced, Nintendo didn't make future firmwares unable to run Twilight Princess (Admittedly, the measures they did take were pretty rubbish!). Same argument could apply to Agent Under Fire with the original Xbox.
Tha is true, i agree to that adding a component with a potential vulnerability isnt that smart if security is important as you say, but what if there is a little chance to know that a feature could be used for exploiting? I am pretty sure that every console maker wants to make a console that is as secure as possible, and that they design their consoles in a way that they think is secure enough
I guess that Sony knew that there was a potential that the OtherOS feature could be used for exploting though, because after all pretty much everything can be hacked, but how big of a chance was it to know that the OtherOS feature could be used for hacking the PS3? And is it always possible for the manufacturers of a hardware device to know in advance which features that can be used for exploits?
But i guess that the question is if Sony should have known that it was a fairly big security risk (when it comes to hacking) to include the OtherOS feature in the PS3. It seems that it took about 3 years before someone manage to use the OtherOS feature to hack the PS3, so it seemed fairly secure to me at least
I also guess that Sony is kind of regreting now that they included the OtherOS feature though. And in theory, the less things things there are that can go wrong.
What did Nintendo do regarding the Twilight Princess hack by the way?
mclem said:
Here's a thought, and it's quite a chilling one: What if Sony *always* knew there was a potential vulnerability through OtherOS, always planned to remove it if it came into the open enough to be a security risk, but offered the option to fool a few more people into making early-adopter purchases, and when they feel it's served its purpose adequately, they pull the plug.
It's pretty unlikely, I'll grant you. But it sounds like it's not impossible in the US, and that bothers me a lot.
Interesting thought, but i think that is pretty unlikely indeed. I think this because i am pretty sure that Sony knew that removing the OtherOS would make some consumers angry (and this happend). When some consumers (and non-consumers as well) are angry at a company, this isnt really good PR, and i think that most companies will do as much as they can to not make any of their consumers angry.
Also, people dont have to upgrade their PS3 firmware if they dont want to. Sony is pretty much saying that if you choose not to upgrade the PS3 firmware to 3.21, then you wont be able to use PSN and you wont be able to play games that require firmware 3.21 or higher. If a consumer wants to keep the OtherOS, then there is a risk for Sony that this consumer will say: "ok, then i wont buy anymore PS3 games etc.". This means less sales for Sony, which then means less profit for Sony.
I also think that the OtherOS feature wasnt really that big of a selling point to people in general. I mean, i am sure that someone bought a PS3 because of the OtherOS feature, but i dont know how many extra consumers that Sony made by including the OtherOS feature on the PS3. Itseems to me that there would be a bigger risk for Sony to lose something rather than gaining something by doing this at least. But this is just my guess though.
Sony also removed the OtherOS support from the PS3 Slim and this was before anyone had published a legimate hack for the PS3, at least from what i know.
I guess that we can never know 100% for sure though, that is true, but i think it is pretty unlikely indeed at least
By the way, i have read that someone have speculated in that Sony included the OtherOS feature as an attempt to prevent hacking, because sometimes hackers tries to get Linux to run on "everything". But when the PS3 already had Linux support, then there were no need to hack the PS3 to be able to run Linux. I am not sure if this is true though, but i think it seems plausible at least
EDIT: I added some text.