The UK high court ruled on Wednesday that Sony's intellectual property rights were being violated by the practice of "modding", also known as "chipping".
Sony had brought its case against David Ball, a UK citizen, who was accused of selling some 1,500 mod chips. Users could install them in their PS2 to play imported games from other regions as well as pirated copies.
Like many console and DVD-drive makers, Sony uses regional encoding that prevents European hardware, based on the PAL standard, from playing software from the US or the Far East.
Mr Justice Laddie ruled that Ball had violated the European Union Copyright Directive, which came into UK law in 2003. He further found that the sale, advertising, use, or possession of such mods chips for commercial purposes was also illegal.
This is the first time that the UK's copyright laws have been used to prevent the circumvention of copy protection.
"We are sending a clear message to manufacturers and distributors of mod chips throughout the PAL territories that we will continue to pursue legal action against them," said David Reeves, president of Sony Computer Entertainment Europe.
Sony recently won a similar case in Belgium, but has also lost cases in Spain and Italy. An Italian court ruled that console owners have the right to modify their hardware once they have bought it.
Sony is now expected to step up its fight against modding in other EU countries on the back of the UK ruling.
Back in 2002, Sony was awarded damages against Newport-based Channel Technology, which had been manufacturing the Messiah mod chip -- the same chip that Ball was accused of selling.
Messiah allowed owners of PlayStation2 consoles to play NTSC games on PAL consoles, allowed PlayStation2 owners to play DVD disks from any region, and provided colour correction for PAL consoles. It also enabled PlayStation2s to play backed-up copies of video games.
Critics of regional copy-protection claim it is actually a way of increasing profits by preventing consumers from importing a cheaper product from another territory.
Talkback
I believe that regional encoding is not a copyright issue but an arbitrary sales strategy of movie industries including Sony as one of leading members. Imagine when we feel our domestic wine is not tasty, we can try imported quarity wine from Bordeaux, etc. In case of games or DVDs, why the same manner should be prohibited by law?
Perhaps people do use mod chips so they can play cheaper versions, as the critics say. *I* would use them, if I had them, to get around the regional restrictions that prevent me from playing games Sony doesn't port to US consoles. For that matter, mutatis mutandis, I feel the same frustration when a film is available only in a region-restricted format that prevents me from seeing it. If films and games are not made available through legitimate means, the companies should not be surprised that their potential customers try other means. Stop regionalizing, and law enforcement can more clearly go after those who truly are operating with criminal intent.
It's Just bloody prive fixing hiding behind copyiright.
Stop letting the companies regionilise and we can all start stopping the money going to criminal organisations. Remove the econoic arguement for piracy. It cheap and sell it far!