How are mod chips illegal?

[DaMulta]

I have seen these stories of late that make ROM Chips illegal. There are people going to jail over this.

1: They do not have any games backed up on them it's just a chip

2. Why are chips for cars legal? If a chip makes you go faster and that is against the law what makes this different?

3. There are not making or telling people where to get illegal files.

4 If you do a soft hack isn't that the same thing? Like doing home brew on a PSP?

What does the law say?

 

[JrRacinFan]

Mod chips? As in console gaming?

In general, the bios/firmware that needs to be on the chip is a copyrighted reversed engineered software revision that has been hacked for use as a POSSIBLE form of piracy.

It isn't the chip itself that is illegal in the states, it's what needs to be in the chips ROM that makes them illegal.

I will take the first generation xbox for example. The developmental modchips were primarily produced as a means to put something called Cromwell on them, which is a linux based HOMEBREW and was not reverse engineered from the xbox kernel. The modchips were first produced for the xbox1 for one item only, that was Linux, which is strictly open source and is not illegal.

Softhack's are just as bad as the bios you would flash.

Of course, noone will tell you where to get any of this information. I will though because you are asking, but I can only tell you so much in public forums.

I hope this helps.

 

[NamesDontMatter]

here you go

1. They are unnecessary to play backed up illegal game files and have no other use.

2. Ebay HP chips (the ones under 20$) do not work. real replacement ECU chips improve timings and ratios (I'm keeping it general) and increase performance. Automotive chips can be illegal in SOME states because they tweak the engine in ways to create illegal emission levels. Mod chips for Consoles do none of that.

3. Sure they don't tell you where to get them, but everyone already knows where. Their only purpose is to access illegal material for your console.

4. See software licensing in wikipedia.

 

[HookeyStreet]

I have seen these stories of late that make ROM Chips illegal. There are people going to jail over this.

1: They do not have any games backed up on them it's just a chip

2. Why are chips for cars legal? If a chip makes you go faster and that is against the law what makes this different?

3. There are not making or telling people where to get illegal files.

4 If you do a soft hack isn't that the same thing? Like doing home brew on a PSP?

What does the law say?

The modchip isnt illegal, its the data stored on the chip that is. This is because it reverse engineers what the game/console developers have written (ie copyright protection)

Most modchips nowadays are sold without any data on the actual chip, you have to program the chip yourself (which is the illegal part).

But just remember one thing: Its only illegal if you get caught

 

[JrRacinFan]

Exactly!

 

[HookeyStreet]

Exactly!

I almost sounded like I know what Im talking about

 

[Kreij]

I almost sounded like I know what Im talking about

Almost. But the code on the modchip is not what makes them illegal, it is what they are used for in most circumstances.

Here is a good article on different rulings on modchips and with whom the liability lies.