George Hotz (a.k.a GeoHot) and his team of lawyers have finally made a public comeback against Sony Computer Entertainment of America (SCEA), filing for complete dismissal of charges against him.
Led by Stewart Kellar, the team of lawyers is seeking dismissal of the case on numerous grounds. Their primary contention is that GeoHot never logged into the PlayStation Network with a jailbroken PS3. While this does not seem like much, it undermines the entire case of SCEA versus GeoHot, as without accessing PSN with a hacked console, GeoHot effectively did not breach PSN’s and SCEA’s terms of service.
Sony claims they’ve ascertained GeoHot used the PSN user ‘blickmanic’ to access PSN via a jailbroken PS3 console with a certain serial number, and resolved the IP address of the console’s connection to a location near GeoHot’s home.
According to Kellar and Hotz however, the serial number Sony claims is GeoHot’s does not match the number on the PS3 Slim purchased by him. While GeoHot allegedly also owns three other used PS3 systems, their serial numbers haven’t been divulged yet.
The second major contention is that Hotz never hacked the SCEA’s domain, or the PlayStation Network, instead, he only hacked the PlayStation 3, which is Sony of Japan’s domain – effectively nullifying SCEA’s right to sue Hotz in the first place. The team has also submitted photographs of sealed user manuals as evidence, stating that while Hotz could have read the terms of service or other details about SCEA’s involvement in the construction of PS3, he never opened them, and so did not know. Hotz has also submitted a letter testifying to this.
[RELATED_ARTICLE]Also significant, is Kellar’s attempt at establishing the correct jurisdiction for the case, claiming that SCEA’s motive behind basing the trial in Northern California was simply to inconvenience Hotz, as he is a resident of New Jersey. They also claim that since Hotz is an individual and not a company, the move was intended to be detrimental to Hotz financially, and, to get favourable grounds of trial at the U.S. District Court of Northern California, which has historically sided with companies instead of individuals.