PlayStation 3 hacker George Hotz must hand over his computers to Sony lawyers as part of a temporary restraining order issued last month, a federal judge ruled Thursday.
Hotz had objected to the stipulation, arguing that Sony would be able to go through its contents, but U.S. District Judge Susan Illston was not convinced: "That's the breaks," she said, according to a report from Wired.
In late January, Illston granted Sony's request for a temporary restraining order against Hotz, who hacked the Sony PS3 and posted his circumvention technique on his Web site, as well as links for others to do the same. As part of the TRO, Hotz was banned from posting or distributing those links or information about his hacking techniques. He was also required to turn over computers, hard drives, CD-roms, DVDs, USB sticks, or any other storage devices on which the circumvention devices are stored.
Hotz objected to that last part, but Judge Illston was not having it. "Here, I find probable cause that your client has got these things on his computer," she said, according to Wired. "It's a problem when more than one thing is kept on the computer. I'll make sure the order is and will be that Sony is only entitled to isolate … the information on the computer that relates to the hacking of the PlayStation."
Earlier in January, lawyers representing Hotz argued that he hacked the PS3 to add back a feature that Sony had removed. Hotz, the lawyers claimed, "re-enabled" OtherOS functionality, or the ability to dual-boot the PlayStation 3 using some other OS, such as Linux.