Sony is facing another fight on their hands as a new USB dongle has been released which bypasses Sony's most recent efforts to lock down the PS3 and prevent pirated games from being played.
The original "PS3 Jailbreak" was released after security experts pinpointed security flaws within the PS3 design, that allowed the master key to be revealed. Sony patched the PS3 to prevent the original Jailbreak device from working, and while it took a couple of firmware revisions, firmware 3.60 successfully blocked the originally device from working, and so games released after 3.60 stopped working on 3.55 PS3s, as Sony dictates that publishers must make their new games work with firmware 3.60 or newer.
But the new device, dubbed "Jailbreak 2", has now managed to by pass the measures put in by Sony in 3.60, and new games such as FIFA 12, Driver: San Francisco have been demonstrated to work, with a few caveats. First up, a PS3 with 3.55 firmware is still needed, and second, instead of being able to play games downloaded to the PS3, pirates must first burn the downloadable game ROM to a Blu-ray disc for games released after 3.60 (games released before 3.55 can still play off the HDD).
The device is already being sold in a test run in Indonesia, for around $50.