feds crack down on mod chips

[elbarto241]

fresh from hackaday.com, seems the feds have started cracking down on shops and people who sell mod chips for their console. they raided 32 diffrent installers and distributors in the US, sad.....


whose next? us?

[AJ@PR]

Hmmm.....

Seems like I should order my chip ASAP.

EDIT: This sucks.



I also encourage you to check out their pictures (http://www.ice.gov/pi/news/multimedia/archive/index.htm) of illegal devices they're confiscating. There is some cruel irony that none of the provided are actually owned by ICE or the DHS but are rather copyrighted images created and owned by the modchip manufacturers and stripped straight off of their websites.


exOnLinestore.com... it's offline. Like, literally. It looks 'dead'.

[Bucko]

Lucky it's not illegal here in Australia.

[elbarto241]

lol. i live in North-West Harris county :D

did u hear they booed clemens when he was playin astros, that must have been heartbreakin for him.

**on toppic**

no but yea, this completly sucks. order your chips now people!!!!

**POUNDING ON DOOR** "ITS THE FBI, OPEN UP**
me: "AAHhhhhhhhhh ruuuuuuuuuuNNNnn" "Nooooooooo not PS2" :D

[Crazy Buddhist]

exOnLinestore.com... it's offline. Like, literally. It looks 'dead'.

It literally looks alive and in business now. :)

CrazyB

[AJ@PR]

It literally looks alive and in business now. :)

CrazyB


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Are we looking at the same page bro?
Everything is 'out of stock'.

[elbarto241]

this is from the xbox scene article,


"FallsInc - When ICE hit me, they had a warrant for my grandma's house where I had all my packages sent. They had a picture of the house, and a description of it, meaning they were ready to come find me. When they were there, they didn't find much, since I hadn't had my computer and most modding stuff there for a while, but I continued to have the orders sent there for security of the packages. They went in the house and woke everyone up and watched them get dressed and started going though everything that was in my old room, and the stuff I had in the garage. They took anything that was related to gaming. They opened all the mail I had waiting for me there (which included someone's Xbox and $150 for a mod and 400gb), and took all the consoles and all console parts that I had stored there they even took my original xbox1 games, that were in retail cases. They took my 360, power brick and video cable, while its modded with xtreme 5.1b, it has never had 1 single burned game booted on it. They also felt it necessary to take all my old Xbox parts, mostly dead, my controllers for the 360 and Wii (?) and packed it in a box, and left."

imagine that happening to one of us? i wouldnt know what to do

[SgtM]

It's usually NOT kosher to discuss mod chips here..

[AJ@PR]

It's usually NOT kosher to discuss mod chips here..

True... gonna take out the link to the store.
We can discuss the news item. :)

EDIT:
http://forums.xbox-scene.com/index.php?showtopic=615575&st=0

I think that's a worth while editorial to read.

If somebody thinks otherwise, the link can be removed ASAP.

[elbarto241]

oh crap, seriously? want me to close down the thread or take down the link?

[Crazy Buddhist]

Are we looking at the same page bro?
Everything is 'out of stock'.

I didn't dig as far as checking stock levels .. but just saw you could still get "into" the store. Looking deeper it seems you are right - even if the item is listed as "in stock" on the list pages when you get down to detail I can not find one item they have in stock.

Their online support is also offline.

StoopidB

[calumc]

just incase anyone hasnt seen this yet:
kYvZnTFpip0

[AJ@PR]

^^^ It's all good man. :)


You know, it's curious, because the reason I wanted the mod chip was for:
1- I'm going to do one of those xBox media centers... I have an extra xBox
2- The actual xBox is crazy... perfectly new DVD movies, most of the time, don't play.

The sad part is, that I suspect they don't play because Microsoft, in their eternal wisdom, ""upgraded"" my xBox via xLive for DRM and anti-piracy measures.
But, again, it can be a perfectly new movie... open wrapper... and it won't play. I give it a 50/50 chance.

I wouldn't get it for doing illegal stuff (piracy), as I'm really not a 'gamer'.
And god knows I wouldn't 'mod' and get online in Halo, as I despise those people beyond belief.

Just my 0.02

[elbarto241]

ROFL> OMG THAT IS THE SINGLE FUNNIEST THING IVE EVER SEEN! "dont worry, hes not that desperate" LOL ouch :D nice find cal +rep for sure

[Crazy Buddhist]

Calum .. thats funny as hell + (imaginary) rep ... I can't rep you .. and don't want to offer a gold star as culturally that could be awkward given that ^^^ :D

[elbarto241]

a guy on over on bit-tech forums brought up a intresting point:


"exactly, i have a chipped PS2, but i only use that to run games off the HDD (As the laser if failing) i still have the games, i haven't pirated anything
Just because you could pirate, doesn't mean you will

hell, every PC on the planet is capable of pirating music, does that mean we should all have our PC's taken away ?"

any thoughts?

[calumc]

good point elbarto. itunes is capable of copying copy protected music cds, so should the music companies start suing apple?

[Mitternacht]

this is from the xbox scene article,



imagine that happening to one of us? i wouldnt know what to do

I read that this morning. Shame that it happened. I got the hint, but didn't know that it would be taken so severely.

Edit: My chip is in those pictures.

[Helix666]

Seeing the crackdown on modchips made me pretty darn mad (if I tone down my language a bit).

This doesn't affect me directly, but if they can succeed in stopping people modding XBoxes, what if they try to stop people modding PCs?

In fact, I was so darn mad, I had to go for some retail therapy. (On a plus note, I now have a new trackball in place of my mouse)

What infuriates me most is that laws (or whatever the DMCA is, I don't know.) can be worded so damned vaguely that they can grab almost anyone/anything for violating them.

I first found out about this on Hackaday and they are, understandably, a little upset.
http://www.hackaday.com/2007/08/03/modder-crackdown-in-the-us/

</rant>

[elbarto241]

yea helix, thats where i first found out about this madness.

that law you said is really VAGUE. its basically like a blank check or blank seach warrant, you can do anything with it :(

[Mitternacht]

I wonder if the value of the chips themselves or the value of the modded xboxes will go up.

[.Maleficus.]

This doesn't affect me directly, but if they can succeed in stopping people modding XBoxes, what if they try to stop people modding PCs?
If you mean case modding, they can't. That would be like getting sued for painting a house. If you mean hardware mods (using a pencil to unlock multipliers on CPUs, etc.) then maybe.

But like someone posted (too tired to look back), taking away modded Xboxs because someone may or may not be pirating games would be like taking away computers because people may or may not pirate something (a much broader field too).


Dumb. Those people are dumb. At least they can't stop a softmod.

[DaJe]

Lucky it's not illegal here in Australia.Which means people in the U.S. could order Australian made chips ^_^

[Bopher]

whose next? us?

That would seriously not be cool.

"You can take my computer mods when you can pry them out of my cold dead fingers. And you better be sure I'm dead because if I wake up and you're taking my stuff you're getting a punch in the face."

[DaJe]

just incase anyone hasnt seen this yet:
kYvZnTFpip0

Yeah, no one here has seen that at all



http://thebestcasescenario.com/forum/showthread.php?t=8900


This video, it's just put together so perfectly. It's a clip from a movie that's subtitled to make it look like Adolf Hitler is bitching about getting his 360 banned from Live.



kYvZnTFpip0

[xenosagarox]

I'm pretty sure if you order foriegn chips, customs will confiscate and bust whoevers address is on the box.

[simon275]

The chips will be made in Taiwan or somewhere under a brand name then bought wholesale by distributors who sell to the public. Now the only way to get mod chips in the states now will be to order them from overseas. This is very worrying that there has been a crack down. I hope the laws don't get changed here.

Also here is a first hand account of a guy who got raided. He is a bit slack using his grandmas address to receive packages. It meant though that the ICE didn't have a warrant for his house. But he let them in anyway.

I reckon He should of said no to them and called his lawyer and destroyed the evidence. But then again they may just give him a slap on the wrist or a fine as he has fully cooperated.

http://www.xbox-scene.com/xbox1data/sep/EElyEEkAllysyVJWYQ.php

[Redundant]

Wow, that sucks for hardware modders.
I mean, you'd think they'd have something more important to do like catch terrorists...

Guess it's time to move to Sweden. (or some other place the Feds won't go)
Otherwise, I'll need reinforced doors and walls and sentry guns with live ammo everywhere. ;) (And I'm not even a mod chip user but with the way things are going...)