Almost 4 years in prison
Although the affected party asked for 5 years in prison, and the accused 19 months, it will finally be 3 years and 4 months in which Gary Bowser must be locked up behind bars. It is an intermediate agreement that both parties have reached, although the thing does not stop there, since he has also been fined dizzying amounts.
A million dollar fine
On the one hand, Bowser accepted a fine of $4.5 million for the facts, however, he has been awarded another fine of no less than additional 10 million dollars. With this, Nintendo wants to set a precedent with which to warn all those who try to follow in Bowser’s footsteps, making it clear that intellectual property is extremely sensitive in the offices of the great N.
The United States government itself has clarified that the sentence has been so harsh and with such an important fine due to the high profile that was handled in the lawsuit, something that will serve to translate as a warning to all those firms that are carrying out or are going to carry out similar operations.
Will this sentence serve any purpose?
On the one hand, the fine and imprisonment have made it clear that intellectual property is not to be played with. Although the exact profits generated by their operations are unknown, the economic penalty seems to be up to the task, since the leaders of Team Xecuter had a quite extensive history in that of modifications with chips.
The problem is that the modifications of the consoles must be something allowed, since the user, as the owner of the hardware, will be able to do what he wants with it. The infraction, however, was in the use of software that allowed the execution of illegal copies of Nintendo games, sometimes including roms to make the product more attractive to the end user.
The case is not closed
But if you thought it was all over, you’re wrong. There are still two people involved in the case, as Max Louarn and Yuanning Chen are completely missing, so they have not been brought to trial at this time. Louarn was initially detained alongside Bowser at the start of the operation, but the period of freedom he enjoyed has allowed him to escape being called to trial.
What is the current status of Switch hacking?
Nintendo’s handheld console remains a vulnerable product, and the execution of pirated code is possible with a series of steps that only require software. Any user can run homemade code from home by following a few simple steps, so the main problem continues to be the publication of illegal ROMs on the Internet, something that Nintendo can practically do nothing against.
For this reason, the prison sentence will serve to reduce attempts to market products that make use of the intellectual property of companies, but we fear that piracy as such will not end these measures.
