136: Team Xecuter
01:25:37 Share

Okay, I feel I read about this story about a video game and I thought was interesting. So um so what I starts out on steam, steam is a video game marketplace, right? And you can downe steam and through there you can buy video games to play and stuff.

It's a nice system. I like steam because IT provides a sort of standardized way to get games. See, before these games for the PC, we're just all over the internet. S there is no central place to go other than your local games stop. And you had no idea if the game you found on the internet was legit or not.

They could have mawar in IT or maybe IT wasn't a complete game or some weird knockoff pirated version steam on this problem too, in this why they made the marketplace and they developed three step process that all games must go through before they can be sold on steam. First is that you have to submit your steam page, then you have to submit your game for review. And then of those things are approved by steam, you have the option to publish your game on their platform.

Yeah, well, someone looked at this and they were like, hum, I wondering if I get my game on this team without having to go through any of that process. So they made the most boring game you can think i've called watch paint dry. Yes, in fact, if you have downloaded IT and and stop this game, all you do is sit there and watch paint.

Try surely a game this stupid would be rejected by steam. Well, this game developers started going through the steps and how to get a game into steam. They first created a developers account.

I was going to the process, but during those steps on steam's website, there were some questions, and one of them was a drop down menu that asked what stage game is in. Well, this person decided to try submitting some answers that weren't in the drop down options, which returns some weird results. And using that information, they were able to send data to steam, saying the game is currently published.

They basically skipped the first two steps where steam had to review IT and just trick the website into thinking that was published. And sure enough, that worked. The game was available on steam for anyone to download.

Watch paint dry by past all the checks to get on the steam. IT was therefore like a whole day before they noticed IT and took IT down. Steam has fixed this problem, so you can't buy passed anymore.

But it's an interesting exercise as in IT to try to trick a video game marketplace to list your game has been reviewed and approved, which makes the users trust that this game is OK. There's a lot of trickery that goes on in the world of video games. These are true stories from the dark side of the internet. I am jack ryder. This is darkness diaries.

This episode is sponsored by delete me. I hope dark and aris has taught you something about how people can use your data against you. But what do you do once your data is out there? Because IT feels impossible to try to take IT off the internet, how are you meant to fight these massive data brokers or selling your info? Well, you could try out the service called delete me.

Delete me does all the hard work of constantly monitoring and removing the personal information you don't want on the internet. Data brokers hate delete me because your personal profile is no long where there is to sell, and then delete me will tell you what they found and where they found IT and what they managed to remove. I tried IT, and they immediately got busy scaring the internet for my name and gave me reports on what they found on me.

And then they got busy deleting things for me. It's great to have someone on my team when IT comes to my privacy, take control of your data and keep your private life private by signing up for delete me now at a special discount. Dark dari listeners today get twenty percent off you delete me plan when you go to join delete me to ash dark net diaries and use promotion de D D twenty out checkout the only way to get twenty percent off is to go to join delete me dot com sih dark net dies and enter code dd at checkout that's join delete me dot com sah darkness dies code D D twenty.

This episode is sponsored by a threat locker ran somewhere. Supply chain attacks and zero day exploited can strike without warning, leaving your businesses sensitive data and digital assets vulnerable. But imagine a world where your cyber security strategy could prevent these threats, that the power of threat locker, zero trust and point protection platform, robot cyber security is a non negotiable to safeguard organizations from cyberattacks.

Threat locker implements a proactive, denied by default approach to cyber security, blocking every action process and user, unless specifically authorized by your team. This least privilege strategy, medicaid, the exploitative of trusted applications, and ensures twenty four, seven, three, sixty five protection of your organization. The core of threat locker is its protect sweet, including application allow, listing, ring fencing and network rol.

Additional tools like the threat locker, detect E D R, storage control, elevation control and configuration ation manager enhancer yb security posture, and streamline internal IT security Operations. To learn more about how threat locker can help mitigate unknown threats in your digital environments and allowing your organization with respect and compliance frameworks, visit threat locker dot com. That's threat locker dot com. I'm really excited about this episode because I think this is one of the most requested episodes i've been asked to make. But even though a lot of you have sent me article after article about the story, the problem is the main guy and the story gary boulter er has been unreachable until now.

Testing one, two, three. Testing one two, three.

I recall when you are jack anytime. great. Thank you. Um hi gary. Hello jack.

Good to hear from you.

What is IT like the n on the outside?

No, it's it's interesting. I mean, a lot of getting used to things that have a taking for granted today, just sitting outside way and to come here at and the rain and stop and watching corals and listening the birds sing as there was like smelling the flowers and the garden was like, I never, never felt that within three years. So that was like was like a new experience to me all over again. So little things like that are amazing.

So I have in a gary, well, let's find out. So let's go back nineteen eighty four or four. Is that right?

A long time go actually was bored at one thousand nine hundred and sixty nine. And by nineteen and seventy nine I was already working on computers, stuff. So by one thousand nine hundred and eighty four, I had already started my own company, and I was manufacturing software, that time for the texas and home computers.

So gary is in his fifties now. But to probably tell the story, we need to go back in time to the eighties. At this point, windows wasn't even to think yet. Apple was just tinkering around in garage.

So who was the big player in the personal computing scene? Texas instruments? They built this little machine that you could play a few games on and type on into some basic tax. Gary loved IT and thought that was really cool.

The home computer world crashed in the eighty three, eighty four period. Everybody weren't belly of commodity ary. T.

I. Time to think clear. The whole industry collapsed. So there was a huge market of people that wanted to support the machines. Now the manufactures won't make in any more, but there hundreds of million sold.

So that's where the original hobby gest market came out and people were uh grouping together, trying to figure how a programming es themselves make new hardware and continue supporting the equipment. So that's one of the uh areas where my company fitted in. I was manufacturing um devices uh originally just software and then eventually hardware and that continue to keep in the machine alive, waiting until new ones came out. So IT was a very profitable business when I started in the eighties, until I started a diet. And the nineties when windows came out.

Gary wood, programmer software, using the basic programing, language assembly and texas instruments, his own propriety language called GPU. He'd make little programs on IT to make the computer do more stuff. But then on top of that, he was also creating replacement parts for this computer because of something were to go bad.

Texas instruments wasn't making, replace my parts and gay love this little. And he knew how. So he would just get the parts and sort of them together and make new parts like graph hic processors.

Another hardware were sourcing the part of the video processors in the memory. But I was actually making the I designed the circuit board myself, and I had A A contract manufactured and then bring the parts in, like arrow and future. And then I had employees that was hands staring. Now the device is together, and we were shipping and vote by male order once the orders came in.

He was manufacturing computer parts. And I find that fairly impressive. I mean, he was certainly ahad of his time to be a start up computer part maker in the nineteen eighties.

right? I didn't actually are making the the hardware are until about nineteen ninety. Uh, uh, the first part of the eighties was just concentrating on software. So what's around eighty nine, one thousand hundred and ninety? I started actually manufacturing hardware. I have a lot of inside context and taxi cement that had the released information on how the video process, which work N T I license the original code to gammage a. So I just pit back on using the a processor for me mahar and finding a way to make IT combatted with the texas, which required some changes in the the Operating system, and that I actually went back text element and got a license from them to modify the the original Operating system so that would support the newer graphic systems.

This is an interesting note that I want you to keep in your head. Gary was making program for this computer and then working on ways to even improve the whole system, like making IT work even Better than intended and have more features and abilities. And he was altering the computer so much that he asked texas instruments for a permission to do this, just to play IT safe.

They were done with that system. I didn't really care, in fact, the little hole tax right off to dissolve that whole ARM of the company that was working on this. So they didn't mind him cracking IT open and modifying to his hearts content.

They were fine if he even made money on his mother. Or software. And I think that's the way things should be.

It's how we progress with technology. It's to improve upon someone else is code and someone else is hardware. And the improved versions take us to new places, and IT becomes a new standard for how things work. So to me, this sounds great that he was modifying the little computer to do bigger and Better things with you.

Then I never own the superintendent and or even I I tired. I wasn't interested in that. But when windows came out, h things started to change.

My business started to go down hill. Uh, people are moving on. They were starting to build a PC computers.

There was no more a market for texas, my stuff. So I switched my business into a with another partner. We formed a company called jenee computers, and I started a building custom pcs based on people's orders.

And from that type of business I started, uh, repairing video game systems. So by two thousand and a one, there was a lot of video game councils. Uh, people are coming in with playstation ones, the regional x boxes.

And I went from the building computers to fixing the video game systems. So that's where slowly slip because there is no more market for the texas ment h system. Uh, during that time, career fixing .

broken video game systems. This seems like an easy private for him. After all, a gaming system is simply a computer. IT has a graphics processor, microchips, logic boards, same as a computer. But there was a big difference.

The biggest effort with the video game systems is the reino computers that are manufactured in the the seventies and eighties. They allowed you rather the box to do programing. Uh, they came of a language.

They came with A A menu. I told you how I work. You could just sit down and start typing code and using IT recording IT to cassette.

We didn't own a floppy driver recording IT a floppy drive itself, but with the video game systems that was impossible. So that's where that the sly came, is like why this is a computer that has memory, has everything in that. Why can we sit there and program ourselves? So um that's where the I slowly started switching to the dark side.

I want to see these systems unlocked. And IT was difficult to repair the systems too because you you had you couldn't just source the parts. The computer IT was easy.

Could you could order a new memory ships from fruit? You could order new processors from the regional company. You could we moved them, put the men now they had custom stuff and you couldn't just, uh, put a new device. So we there was more of interest there is like, what can I just can't we've place the the lens in the place station one?

I mean, is that really gary who's going to the dark side to try to code these things or modify them? Or is IT intendo going to the dark side by locking out developers and purposely making IT hard for them to modify IT in any way? Nintendo did not want people tank kerry with their system.

Adding things to IT or writing any customs software for their system was just a big no no for them. And I won't remind you that the N. E.

S. System was just a little computer IT had a bootstrap BIOS somewhere that all needs to load before a can execute game. I mean, just look at the first version of the N.

S. IT was called for mcm, which is short for family computer. It's clearly a computer now when something failed on an intendo. And yes, IT was very turkey to fix IT. You might find someone who knows a few basic things that they can try, like maybe taking a part out of another any as and putting IT in yours. But intendo wasn't helpful at showing you how these things were architected to allow you to fix IT or buy replacement parts.

So by hiding all this info, made IT extra hard for people to to fix their own systems and are also made IT really tRicky to modify them, to improve upon them, to upgrade them. They also used weird custom hardware that was just crazy hard to find those parts. It's like these games system makers were anti innovation.

They did not want people to customize or add on anything special to their systems. Just play the games that we approve the way we want you to. And that said, don't try any funny business with your own computer. Was there was their push back from the video game makers of like, hey, what you doing get insiders. Are councils what's gone on here?

Not originally. I mean, are the original uh, stuff that was done like on the P S one and original x box, there was no push back. What's ever they looked at IT is just a percentage of loss of business and they would take more protection on their desks of a parallel uh started happening like in the playstation one when the first ships started to come out a bypast, the boot p system, they added more sex on the game itself to look shut IT down.

Electronic arts, the publishers themselves, with the ones that are more into locking out system electronic arches, one of the first ones that started adding, uh, anti piracy stuff on the P. S. one.

okay. So yeah, people in the gaming scene were taking these systems apart and trying to modify IT, making the game systems do new things that they didn't originally do. And the game makers hated this. They wanted desperately to keep their systems from being tampered with and started making games that we not work if you did tamper with IT.

So the original P. S. One ships wouldn't shut down. They will just keep on jack in the signal. So h tron ic sorts.

They add a code in the game itself to check to see if that signal st. Still being injected. Then they realized ball that must be IT must be modified because we're not saying signal more from the desk.

Why is the signal still there? So then newer ships had to come out ever called stuff ships that would shut down after all a while, and that would got bike past of the original sex of the a. did.

Let's back up a second. As i'm learning about all this, i'm getting superfetation ony with the history of video game systems. So before the P. S. One was an intendo, and there was some drama going around over air that's worth highlight um there was A U K.

Game developer in the nineties called code masters and they started making games for the commodore sixty four, which is just an early computer and you didn't need to ask comedy for permission to make a video game for their system. In fact, comedy or made IT super easy for you to program on IT. IT came with a compiler that was easy to access.

So code masters made games for IT. Then when entendu came out with the N. S. Code, masters wanted to make games for this too. But there was a big problem with this plan.

Nan tando only wanted approved games to be played on their gaming console, so they were strict on what games studios got a license to make games for intendo, and they didn't share any information publicly like how to develop for IT or anything unless you had a license. What's more is any, yes, had a little luck out, chip, that would check if the game you inserted was licensed and if IT wasn't, IT wouldn't let you play IT. Well, code masters thought this is an interesting chAllenge and poked and proud at the N.

S. Until they figured out how to get an unlicensed game to load on the N. S.

By passing the lockout chip. And with this, they're able to create and sell N. S. games.

And tender was not happy about this, an unlicensed game for sale in our system, how you but code masters took at a step further since they had this working knowledge of how the N. S. Loaded games and stuff, they develop something called a game.

Jie, this was a clever little device, and IT modified the game in real time to let you cheat if you wanted extra lives, or jump extra high, or just go right to the final boss games. Gene could do that for you. IT essentially gave you superpower in the game that you were going.

Now, these are all one or two player games back then. There was no online playe. So cheating in a one player game isn't really ruining the game for anyone else.

Code masters didn't call this a cheap device, so they called IT a video game and answer. And they develop this in the U. K.

And licensed dit in the U. S. To accompany and called globe, which was a major toymaker back then.

And they started selling them in like regular toy stores. I mean, you could buy a game, jane, and like, came toys to us. I remember my neighbor had one, and I think his mom body from sears. But little did I know when I was playing on my neighbors game, Jenny and kendall was taking globe to court over the silt device, saying IT was a copyright violation. Vinta was saying the game jene was a derivative work and therefore a subject to copyright infringement.

This means intendo is saying that the game Jenny made minor modifications to the game to make IT something new, but not making IT unique enough to be something original, and was profiting from the original creators, kind of like if I put google eyes on the mona lisa and try to sell IT as my own original work. Well, IT went to court and judge ruled in favor of globe. And the game jane, the judge said, took the definition of a derivative work means you have to have a separate copy of that original work.

Games gene does not create a separate copy, but instead adds to the original copy because you still need the original copy to use IT. So clearly, it's not taking away from the sales of the game. The judge also went on to say that consumers have the right to fair use and can modify games however they please for personal use.

This was a huge win for game models. Now they had a court case to prove that they had the right to modify their systems and games for personal use. Now if we look across the air at the P.

C world, the software makers there had no problem with you making personal backup of the software. You, the thing is floppy desks and cities were notorious for going bad and getting ruined. So was practice by everyone.

Even my granda knew that as soon as you buy a new game for your PC, the first thing you do always is make a copy of IT as a backup. And everyone was good with this. P.

C. Makers didn't care game makers in OK. They were fine with IT because IT was protected under the copyright act. Section one seventeen says if you buy software, you have the legal right to make a personal copy of that software. In fact, it's even essential if you wanted do proper archiving of your digital files.

And so with early computer games and software, there was no and I copying methods in place to detect or stop copy games from being played on the computer. That brings us to the dream cast. In one thousand eight ninety nine, saga launched the game council called the dream cast.

And this was a really cool little system. And one thing about these council makers is, the council itself is a lost leader. That is, saga was pricing the dream cast at below the cost IT took to make the system.

But that was okay because they know they would make the money back on the games they sold. So saga was a very aggressive at making sure that you could only play the games that were approved for the dream cast and not any copy versions or anything. My opinion, this may go against section one seventeen of the copyright act, where you are allowed to make copies of the games you have for archive reasons.

The drink cast use something called G D roms, which basically means a gigabit CD. People don't have a drive on their computer that could read these kind of disks. But even if you did get those drivers and try to make a copy of IT, there were two problems with IT. One is IT was protected and you couldn't copy IT. And two, the dream cast had a system in place that even if you did copy the desk, when you let you play with the copy IT only let you play original s cigar did not care if there's violated your right to make book ups of the game you own. In fact, if you put IT in your computer and try to play IT, you'd hear is this .

message warning, this c is for use only on sea dream cast.

Anyway, long story short, this was a chAllenge for some to figure out away from this whole system. And someone did figure out out, they found a way to bypass the anti copy protections on the dream cast. And essentially what happened is that you could go online to a pirate website to download any games you wanted, burn IT to a regular C, D, and put IT in the dream cast without having to modify the dream cast at all.

This was really remarkable because there was no hardware modifications. Did the way the cities were written is that they would trick the dream cast. That IT was a playable disk by a clever use of reversing the randomized method on the dream cast.

And this opened the door up to a pirating dream cast games. I remember when this happened till my friends told me to, I was like, no way. Men, those games are like on gd.

Roms are not CD. This will never work. But he demonstrated me. I was blown away. Well, this is IT last long.

Soon after the parade community announced that you could pirate games on the street cast, sega announced that they were discontinuing the dream cast and we're leaving the video game console business all together. And this was only a few months after launching IT. So yeah, some say piracy wrecked the dream cast, but did IT really.

Two months after the dream cast was released, the playstation two came out, which blew away the dream cast in every way. Performance wise. And the killer feature on the P.

S. Two is that I would play dvds, which at the time was fairly rare for people to have in their home. So why buy A D V D player? You could buy two, which has A D V D player built into IT. People were buying IT for that feature alone.

So in my opinion, on the thing that killed the dream cast wasn't piracy, but the fact that two months after its release, the playstation to destroy them in sales. So that brings us to the playstation two world. Remember the ma chip back then?

Yeah, I member ship and everything. And if you get one, no.

with the .

gma sigma, I think I had an sigma one time. Uh, IT was a lot of a lot of wires to save into the export.

Yeah, tell me, tell me your experience either.

These chips, I was further, the playstation system IT was one of the first ships that allowed A D, V. D. To boot on the playstation.

So the masia was a marge chip that you can sort a on to a place station, too. And I was created by paul, I believe, IT by past the anti copy protections, and that you play copy games. And then when the x box came out, paul also made a my trip for IT called ma.

They came out of a bias that add IT new features allow you to put in bigger heart drives. Uh, unlike the system, uh, I hate that the the way I had to modify the system of me with the wires and everything, uh, my solution at the time, uh, I would actually just take the flash ship off and there's reprogramming IT. And then because IT back on, I had the things that was in the business before I manufacturing hardware, I had the programing equipment and the sudden dull, so for me, which corker just deserted, the, the, the flash ship reprogram on on my P, C, and stored back. And I could do that whole Operation within less than five minutes was was a lot quicker, is an actually opening a sitting there and side in a bunch of virus.

Did you ever sell that as a service? Like, hey on my job, your ux box for you.

Ah I did for a while during the two thousand and four to about two thousand and eight, I did do some modifying a councils for people as a service.

Did anybody ever get mad for that? Um you know video game makers or anything hey, season insists that your minding our stuff, we don't want to.

No, they didn't.

Do you think they cared?

I think so they were. They were actively, uh, moderate forms, even back down and and watching information yeah the game .

makers were absolutely watching the video game mode forums and they wanted to know what cheats and minds were out there for their systems and games. And when paul oin made these two chips, that's when SONY came in and threatened him with legal action. This forced paul to stop importing masia chips for the P.

S. two. But he didn't stop people from buying them directly from taiwan. And I didn't stop paul owen from making more chips for the x box.

And in my opinion, it's really cool that someone is able to, I make a microchip to enhance the gaming system, because I hate you when these things just so propria arian secret and locked down, that you can even repair the game system of a breaks. In fact, I don't even want to call these things much ships, notice accessories, ies for your gaming system. Like the other day, I wanted to put an m two hard drive in my computer, but my mother boy didn't have a thought for IT.

So I had to go buy A P C, I E card that enabled me to use the m two drives. This is not against any rules. This is a perfectly fine accessory to buy for your computer. The x box is a little computer, and IT didn't let you add a hard drive. And so was paul own's release of the enigma ship that allowed you to add an extra hard drive.

Can you imagine if your PC was so locked down that you could not add a second hard drive if you wanted, not even an external USB one? Paul made another mind for the x box this time, calling IT the executor. And he liked that name so much that he started calling his little group team executor, which is an important part of this.

I mean, it's the title of the episode, right? So even though he was threatened with legal action to stop producing the P S, too much ships, IT didn't stop him from making new x box mod ships and publishing them under the name team executor. Now the courts didn't think all this money was cool, like I do.

In nineteen ninety eight, the digital mEllenda copyright act D M C A IT was established, creating a whole new set of rules for copyright infringement in the digital age. And specifically, there were clauses that talked about circulation. The D M C A criminalized the act of circumventing access controls, which is what video game makers were pointing out.

When trying to take down these mud ship makers, they were saying, look, you're going through great links to circumvent our anti piracy controls. That's A D M C. A violation. And video game makers were taking their cases to court and winning them.

The video game companies, they wanted to a protect the quality of the system. And that's where a tender actually started that I would put labels on uh on their boxes. They sold being quality assured uh certified uh because what killed the systems in the eighties, uh, was one of us a shovel where there was just too much stuff that Terry twenty six hundred, uh the time I sin Clair, even the texts cement home computer, there was taunt of stuff being uh developed and a lot of IT wasn't worth the eighty nine dollars, the sixty nine dollars.

I didn't buy that because i'm A P. C game of myself and there's pretty much an infinite amount of games for me to play. And yet while i've bought some judds, I never get mad at microsoft from making a PC with bad games.

I don't even blame amazon when I buy something from there, and he breaks right away. I just learned that i've got to do my research more before buying stuff. Isn't anyone in the video game industry heard of the term cabyle emptor or buyer be where the buyer knows are taking a rest one buying something? It's okay. Did you did you do much pacy at the time where you downloading wears? I mean, what was your experience with wears in the nineties?

In the in the nineties, I didn't do too much piracy actually. Uh, I almost, I bought almost all the games that came out that I was interested in. The only pacy I did a little bit was actually on the computer side .

by the two thousands. With the D, M, C, A starting to show itself more and more in courts, P, C, game makers started adding their own and I copy protections. This attempted to make the impossible for users to make copies of the software they bought.

And I remember when this started happening at the time, the sentiment was we no longer own these games. We are just renting them because it's only a matter of time before this this stops working or IT locks you out somehow and you just have to buy a new one. And I get IT.

There is money lost due to piracy? sure. But I think all these anti copying measures hurt the regular consumer and stiff's technological growth.

What do you mean? I can add anything to buy computer that I bought an own. It's mine. I should be able to modify IT anyway, I like.

But the truth is, the major driver for most of these mods was to enable piracy to let you downtown games off the internet for free and play them on your console. And video game makers thought this was drastically hurting the revenue, and that's why they went to war in this way. I just wonder if there were Better ways to deal with IT. I mean, listen to this talk by tony. Change ahead of security for x box.

When I first joined the x box, lot of people throughout microsoft, I have to explain to them why the problem we're facing is finally different than the problem that windows needs to solve for its security. So on a windows P, C system, the P C owner is a good guy. He's working with us to prevent his P C.

From being attacked. Um the bad guys are the guys out on an internet trying to compromise his PC. So microsoft, as a Operating system that is working with the PC owner to fight the bad guys out on the internet OK on the x box, the owner is the attacker, although majority of our customers are good, but you have to treat them as the attacker in terms of design in your hardware.

Do you do you hear the way I hear IT video game system owners are the bad guys? IT just sounds weird to me like that just being too aggressive. Your customers. I understand what you're reasoning is here because they're gonna pirate everything.

But is there any research on if you don't do anything to stop the pirates? What percent of people will buy IT? I ve got the vast majority of people who can afford IT will buy IT.

I bet you'll see break out hits, do the piracy. I bet you see people pirate stuff. And then buy the full version later because they like the game so much.

I want to support the game makers, and I bet you'll see a much bigger impact with your game worldwide. If it's available for anyone to play on any budget, look at the humble bundle. For instance, this is a website that sales video games.

And the whole idea here is that you can pay whatever you want for the games. They're put together like a bundle of ten video games, and then you pick the Price of what you want to pay for the bundle. I love this model because if you're poor, you can get great games for like pennies and on top of that, to giving a percent of the revenue to charity.

It's a great way to meet your players where they are and be cool with whatever they can afford. Or here's another thing, I have a birch shop, right, where you can buy shirts and stuff on my online store. Well, with that comes a certain amount of scammers, people who buy my stuff and then try to get a refund on IT, but then send back the wrong shirt or nothing at all.

And IT sucks, right? Like that sounds like my shoppers are not to be trusted and their crooks and their scammers yeah well, no. I absolutely do not think my customers are crooks and scams, but I think my customers are fantastic and should be respected.

And even though there are some bad apples involved, I go out of my way to treat everyone with respect. I'll work to make you one hundred percent satisfied with your order, even if you're a scammer. I don't care if something is a right.

I'll send you a new item, give you a refined that's because I personally and more loyal companies that treat me with respect and I don't like going into shops that treat me like some crook or some scammer when i'm not I remember I visited oh, once in europe and someone there told me that when you get on the train in austria, they never check your ticket. And it's because austrians get personally offended if you question whether they paid for their ticket or not. Take IT, please.

How dare you think I don't have a ticket? What do you think i'm a thigh and not on this time? What's the reason of this line of questioning? So they just stopped asking people for proof that they paid their way.

And you know what? I took the train there and nobody asked for my ticket. That wasn't even a turn style.

And IT was such a culture shock to me, but I actually loved that level of trust and respect that the trains gave their passengers. The good people are gonna pay their way, and the majority of people are good. Yeah, sure.

Some will sneak on the train, but we're not going to inconvenience all those good people just so we can find a few bad ones. We'd rather have happy, good customers then making a little extra money by enforcing a paid to ride policy, and would IT even generate more money to check everyone's tickets. I mean, now you have to have a ticket taker on every train all day and nuts and pay their salary.

My point is, if you distrust your loyal customers, it'll create a bad relationship between you and them. Anyway, back on track, I feel like episode is getting me or work IT up. It's causing me to go all over the place some side of renting too much.

okay. So our players in the stories so far, paul o in the guy human team executor and was selling muggy PS and there's gary bowser, who's very front and center of this whole muchie ene. In fact, he's so president on the forums that he is starting to make .

a name for himself on there. I was more popular rationally on on xbox tacker BBS. I was very popular poster on there. Uh, I started then posting on x box that seem posting news for the illustrators on there. And then on another site for the the playstation, I was called P S X death scene.

I was a very popular poster on there, and I started be working with administrator that site, and I was there, uh, when geo hot, uh if remember, uh, George halls, he found original what they called the rookie for the playstation three. He posted a publicly on P. S.

They have scene. And that caused that site to this to take off. Sky rock go from hundred thousand users per day to a million users per day.

There was lawsuits involved. By the time that happened, I was actually a hosting that website for the adminstrator uh I and and certainly crack down her. They went after geo hot.

There was court orders. I I started to posting uh, all what was happening in the court case. There was actually at one time, uh, a movie deal being work, people thought that George halt would, but fights only go all away. And unfortunately I decide to settle. And that was end of IT.

Gary boulter er was so active on these forms that he started getting approached by people to actually be paid to be a foreign madman. The first place that offered him a job, he didn't like that one. But then a guy with the screen name maxa million approached him and offered him a paying jo B2Be a f or m add. How did you mean maximum?

I never met him in person. Not ever, ever, no, never seen him in person. I nobody looks like from a instagram and facebook post and I know what voice sounds like from phone calls I had with him.

But i've never actually uh mad person right but I was intending ced to uh baLance the original owners P S X scene. Uh they they knew him so they introduced me uh to him and we had some phone calls and then he said, luck, I need uh I want to run the site. Uh, you can do whatever you want to decide as launch. You are available to post news. When I give you information about new products, are they going to release the site?

Was max console dock com and maximum had just purchased IT from another person. IT was a fairly popular forever matthai talking about how to hack video game consoles, where to buy mod chips and just news about the morning and video game world. But I didn't trade any pacy or have linked to any pirated games.

No, maxim million is a main character of the story, so let's back up and learn more about him. He's from france. In the nineteen ninety maximum, lion was in the wares seen, which is piracy.

A wares group is one that rips games off the disk, cracks IT free from any anti piracy methods that were on IT and mixit available for anyone to download d and play for free. Maxim million LED the wares group paradox in the nineties. And if you played the pirated games spiral back, then chances are with maximilian group that supplied IT to you in ninety eighty four max, a million had an ini in the telephone company.

And I is someone who works inside the company who would be part of the company. Ah this any was sending him thousands of free calling cards. And I don't know how about maxa million took the stolen calling cards and racked up at twenty two million dollar phone bill with the maximum, was arrested for this, and he played guilty and was sense to almost six years in jail.

He was sent to prison in Virginia. And I think this is a good time for a break while we wave him to get out of prison but stay with us because that's just maximum lions origin story. What he does next is even more crazy.

This episode is sponsored by arctic wolf. A snowball starts off as no big deal, but let IT roll, gain speed and gather size, and soon IT becomes an avante people, wiping out your entire camp. The same goes for social engineering attacks, where a single users mistake complete your whole organization at risk.

This october, let arctic wolf be your guide to surviving the social engineering avh register now for the twenty twenty four arctic gulf f security awareness summit, where theyll outfit you with information insights you need to fill your social engineering survival kit will offer tips, tools and takeaway to keep security awareness top of mind all year long and show you a Better past past the hazards of human risk register now at arctic wolf 点 com flash register。 That's arctic wolf dot com flash register. Some maximum served six years in prison for stealing calling cards. But when he gone out of prison, he seemed like he went back to the pirate scene. He bought the website dvi o he members site called the vo at the time.

Yeah, that was one of the the first uh real is out that they were selling a uh devices from like team execute to and other companies and uh third party controllers and stuff they were uh I I actually used that myself, uh, to buy some more ships back in the day.

So maximum saw was that team executor had been making and selling these mod ships by the tens of thousands. There is a whole system in place. Chips were created in asia somewhere and then shipped in book to the U.

S. And then sold through the the venu site. Max thought this look like a good business and got in touch with paul owen, the owner of team execute. And max offered to buy team executor from paul, the team executor branding the website to supply chain.

Everything was sold to maximum an now that he had this little, much of business, maximum an needed a solid way of getting the word out on his new products. So that's when he decided to buy max console 点 com， a popular motif. m. His idea was that he could use this place to just basically have unlimited marketing for all the things that team executor was releasing and he just needed someone to help run the site and that's when he asked gary.

yeah, the rainy day was I could do whatever I want with the site, keep one hundred percent of ad revenue. But he wanted, uh, a couple spots on the site just for his products. So like the top banner site, uh spot would be for his his products and whenever he had a press release made for a new product. But I had to be a variable on call posted right away, uh that way that site would have the news first, and then everybody else would have to link to that site because of the exclusive news.

wow. Nintendo was all over these forms. And seeing when new mod ships were announced and didn't like this one bit, and they started doing their own research, they found that divo had been getting their chips from home com.

So nintendo went to home kong and opened up a court case against dvi claiming its an infringement on their intellectual property. The hong kong supreme court ruled in favor of in tando, which immediately throws all of the viney's Operations in home. Kn, and the ruling demanded that max pain intendo forty four million eos and damage four million years.

As at a huge fine, I believe maximum just found a different country to get his chips from and kept on doing business without paying any of the fines put on him. So intendo went to his home country, france, to take legal action on him there. They took him the courts, and they told the courts, look, we already found guilty before to be millions and damages.

He had a ent, and he keeps violating our intellectual property. Can you please do something? But the french courts ruled in favor of maximum.

An maxus defense was that intendo was walking out developers from being able to develop on the system, and his much ship allowed anyone to develop on IT and play home blue games on IT and the courts like that. They said, yeah, intendo, what's up with you putting all these locks on your game systems so people can build on IT? Seems rude.

Leave max alone. So intendo took a bad blow there. I think they tried to appeal that case, but I can't find any articles that followed up with IT.

There was this craze of burning back the older systems uh the super attentive, the uh playstation, the saga, many versions of those original councils that people loved. But those systems were locked down again and that they only have a certain selection again by apply station one mini only have like twenty nine games on IT.

yes. So SONY came out with this little play station mini. IT had no option to put any game in IT of any kind.

IT had no game, this reader or a cultured reader, and IT wasn't online, so you download anything more. IT only came with these twins games that were built into IT, and that was IT. You can never play anything more, which is kind of weird, isn't IT.

If you release a mini version of your system that clearly can play, he has one games. why? Restricted to just those two games? So of course, the gaming community was like, we need to figure out a way to get this thing, to play any P S one game. We want a .

the play station one, actually use an open source emulator and just add IT their own with a uh a skin to IT and to select the game. So they were just taking someone else's work that they had made an area later that they could find on github. And some wrote themselves add their own skin and use an android board from china event. The battery is the screen to run the Miller. Okay, I had to .

look this up and research at deeper, because this is going to become important. Later, the mini playstation used the P, C, S, X emulator, which, yes, is open source and is also under the new public license 的 G P L。 Now, even though the P C S X emulator free and open source SONY took IT and put IT on the P S one mini and charged for IT, but the G P R clearly states not okay.

You can put this software on some commercial product and charge for IT. And there's a few things that are interesting about that. The spirit of free and open source software that licensed under the G P, L is that you shouldn't charge for this.

It's free. It's developed by a community of volunteers. And here Sonia lifting IT off github and slapping IT on their little console. But there is nothing wrong with that. According to the letter of the license, IT just contradicts the spirit of the G, P, R license.

And it's so strange to me that a video game console makers such as SONY, would use an open source emulator under latest console. All the mining community did manage to get into this little P, S, one mini, and they loaded up their own emulator on IT, which unlock the system to be able to play any and all P. S.

One games on IT, not just the twenty that came with IT. Now, when maxa million saw how the community was able to bypass this whole thing, he started manufacturing a little USB drive that you can plug into the police station. IT would bypass the protections on IT and allow you to play any pirated games.

Who had, in fact, IT came with a hundred games on IT. This was called the true blue mini. And for an intendo, there was one called the classic two magic. Both of these products were by team executor, but they were selling IT under a different brand at the time. So how much did like these, you know, the classic two magic in the triple of many cars, people .

actually get the Prices. There wasn't, uh, the classic classic to magic didn't have no games. That was mainly to allow you to uh, plug directional casm. So IT added the capture claude itself, I if forget what the pressure is like, fifty nine or seven, nine dollars or song.

So who was making this stuff was in maxa million. Do you think he had the ability to design circuit boards and come up with these hacks? I suppose?

no. Uh, max, uh, like for me, I was that the P R man to get the internet, to get the post there on internet, to get people to know about to, uh, they're flying people to review their products, to get the reviews published. Max is more was more on the marketing side, coming up with the ideas he came up with the name of the products he came up with uh uh ideas of the are the websites and how to market IT to the people.

Uh, he dealt with all the uh finding a resellers to salad to uh get IT, uh all the background stuff, but he was not A A technical guy. He he would do a smart. He knew how technology worked and stuff, but he wasn't an engine.

Did you have any um any input into how they were made or helped to create .

any of those devices? I didn't help any of the newer devices. I had no help and created them. Uh, I knew some of the developers that were working on that. I would chat with them about a bit.

Uh, I will get advances, copies of the the product for testing, uh sometime to to do a product review so that before I started shipping, there's like this is how IT works. Uh, but I was mainly the to uh to do the P R, to do the the crh releases. Uh, what I did even write myself, I would be given the desperate, these pretty written and then they were just add my own age to IT and posted.

did he collaborate with you? I and just like what new product can we come out with? Because you you have a very good understanding of the whole moving scene, what's coming out, what can work, what can work.

And then you're seeing like what there's this new exploit or just hit max, you might want to make a um you know mod for this. This I think would take off. You know just a little suggestion like that to make.

No, I never had those discussions. I then I would post the news on what was happening. He made those decisions on what we do business rise on what we do next.

Uh, sometimes I would anyone know, uh, like when he was work on the switch, I think we know he was working on the switch. You would just teese me saying, is something else coming up? Something coming up until something was actually concrete? A lot of times I was over the loop too. I didn't even know about IT.

So surprisingly, while sitting in researching things, i'm currently seeing a true blue mini clone right there on amazon for forty three dollars, and IT says that has fifteen thousand games on IT. This is an illegal product being sold right there on amazon. And IT just makes me think because video game system makers are actively taking websites to court who sell mod chips.

And this amazon listing has fifteen hundred games bund LED into the modality, which means you can buy pirated games on amazon. No, of course, amazon themselves isn't selling IT. Someone listed IT there on the amazon marketplace, but still they're facilitating the sale of IT faster ing the whole deal, bringing this much of empire of games to the masses.

Why isn't SONY suing amazon over this or trying to tick down their website? Because in two thousand five SONY did get mad at maxa million for selling the same mus for the playstation and they took him to court and SONY one that case, which resulted in max having to pay five million dollars in damages. And that's what the fourth time he's been to court now, and he now owes over fifty million dollars in fines to these games system makers.

At this point, the guy seemed to be unphased by any of this, though he had a rebellious mindset. Well, he felt like an enemy to the game makers. He felt like a hero to the players of the world.

And yeah, a lot of people did really like the stuff he was releasing. He claims that he just wanted to unlock the game system's potential and give users more access and to be able to do more things. My personal opinion about him know is that he's just a business man, and he's business man just is looking for unique ways to mix some extra money. He understands this whole development cycle and manufacturing process marketing as applied chain very well. And he's using .

IT all to his advantage.

Two thousand and seventeen intendo released the switch. Of course, the modern community immediately began breaking IT open and trying to find a way to mud IT. And someone discovered that you could glitch IT by taking the right joy han off and bridging the two points with a paper clip.

And from here you could then get IT to a boot in the recovery mode and have access to diagnostic tools. The modern community took that and figured I had to get the switch to boot to their own Operating system, which basically made IT so that you could play any pirated game on the switch. When maximum saw with the modern community had done, he jumped done in his developer got to work building two physical devices, one that was side into the joy con court and trigger the glitch, while the other would go into the U.

S. B. Drive to have the system boot into a custom firm where and team execute, called this ad on the S. X pro.

The idea is that IT enables you to copy games that you already had or play any priority games that you had. The design was clean and super simple. People who had no experience moving systems could easily get this working, and we're giving a great reviews.

So they had this thing all developed and manufactured, and then they wanted to announce IT on the forum that gary was the mod for. And this is where gary was obligated to promote this device since that was the deal that he made with maxa million. Now when you're a mod maker, you've got some potential things that can go wrong with your whole business.

See sometimes team executed with sell their products for a say, thirty dollars, but then see the exact same product being sold directly out of asia for two dollars. IT was the adversus pirate because the factory that was making the chips for team execute, which just sometimes make some extra and sell them directly to the consumer, totally undercutting team executor. So max didn't want that happening with xx o, so he decided he was going to add his own software into the thing.

So instead of loading the switches native Operating system, the S X pro would load up S X O S, which was basically just an open source emulator. But max took at a step further. He didn't want someone pirated a sex I S.

So he decided that he was going to require everyone to have a license key before using the S X O S. So you had to pay like twenty five dollars just for the license to use this mod. And this angered quite a few people.

First, about paying a license for pilot software. That's unusual. But all method to do this hug was posted rider on the forms.

You could just use a paper clip and a USB cable, add your phone and get the switch to boot into the same emulator. You didn't need the S. X pro at all.

But the idea of IT though, was that IT mix, this whole process of hacking your switch easier, you just had to pay for this easier method. But it's still about the people that they were charging for pirate of software. I mean, the whole point of piracy is to go around having a paid for stuff.

You know, on top of that, some users were getting mad that the emulator in this thing was just a free and open source mulatter. A lot of people were upset because you're taking a free and open source software and charging for IT. But this is ironic because this is the same thing.

Playstation, they would, their P S one mini. Remember the emulator that was on the S X O S was called atmosphere, which was licensed under the gpl, the same as what SONY did. And people were mad at them for charging for this.

Yeah, well, that the problem is going on with everything, even recently, a bread head.

Oh, man, I didn't think about that. But yeah, red hat is a version of linux. And yeah, they took the free and open source linux software and suddenly started charging for IT.

And there's been quite a lot of controversy over that. Like why are you taking other people's code and charging for IT? You didn't write that, but red hats like look at for easy use by anyone in its licensed, another G.

P. S. So it's cool. And again, I think this argument is going back and forth between the letter of the license versus the spirit of the license.

The other thing that people are getting mad about is that some users were reporting that the switch would become broken after using the S X pro. They know they were because what maxed here is that he didn't want someone else trying to understand or steal the software on the S. X pro.

So if you were detected trying to crack into a or poor product at IT, IT would send a signal to completely break your switch. And I think that's going too far. Like sure, this never happens as a Normal user of the S X pro.

But if you poke in peak into IT too much, that breaks your system. Yeah setting your period and software to destroy your switch is just not cool to me at all. But despite all these complaints, the ex provided very well.

A lot were being sold and the reviews were almost always positive. An S, S. Popularity grew.

S X pro was making someone else really mad and hindle. They were like, wait, what you're charging for a device that lets people play pirated games. You're making money from our hard work.

We've gotta stop this. So first I patched IT. All switch is made after two thousand nineteen were no longer vulnerable to this attack. And then they started trying to find and stop this whole team execute Operation. So uber ber chip stock m, another place you was .

one of the the resellers in in the next states I got sued the uh by noted for selling the device, they were one of the first uh we still that was gonna selling the the X X light and X X core for the the switch.

So would at any point you feel like you are a member .

of team execute um uh at the regional al beginning um during the early two thousands, I was just uh a user posting on the forms and helping other people work. In the end I was just A P R guy post in the news and making sure that uh, the testers, uh, could get information on what was happening with the products over to the development. But I was never on actual development side of doing the actual exploits of the or the coding.

I don't don't know if I would feel like i'm a member of this at at any point you know just being i'm like a member you'd be a member of max console a com and feeling like you work for them but not so much a .

member of team maxi cut or no really I wasn't uh I could just say I was like A A in betwen guy. I was more than a tester but not, uh, develop more of a this goal between .

guy was interesting is that you know if if we were to we were to put you on the on on the trial here, we like to look for you prosecuting someone if they have to know how opportunity and motive to do all this. And you have all three, you have to know how of morning chips. You have the opportunity of doing IT because you're doing IT.

And you have, you know the the motive because you like doing IT. So you seem to be the perfect person to create this, to improve upon IT, to come up with ideas, all these things. You will be such a great value asset to the team. I'm surprised maxi, and ask you for more stuff to do.

Uh he he never really wanted me to get too involved. He knew I could, uh, but he want me to be arms linked away from IT in case something did happen. Uh, he said this day is A P R guy because that way, uh, freedom of press, you know, not directly connected IT. Uh, uh, if anything does happen, IT won't hurt you.

Did you have a moral line where or even a rule set on max console where it's like or listen, we don't distributed pirate software here or anything like that.

Yeah, there was actually a lot of rules. Uh, I would not allow links to, uh, pirated stuff. Uh, I would take down ads, uh, that advertise S D cards for, uh, ships.

There was a few times we sell. We tried to do that. I would send them a letter and say, hey, you can do that taking down and there's no refunds. Uh you can you can advertise the product where you can advertise games.

I would actually, uh, take action if I get an actual enforcement letter uh um when I used to publish a mod for like grandfather rock star would send my letters, say, hey, don't don't talk about, uh, games that, uh mod pactual for G, T A, please I was okay. No problem. I took down the post, uh, when a, uh activision stuff got hacked and the sky liners, which were very popular toy activision contact with me, they sent me a season exist.

I took down the information, uh, when the leaks of the so only S D case came out and I posted about IT, uh, so only would say, hey, okay, but take down any links to IT, I would take down the links so that was so back and forth that way too. Uh, there was not supposed to be any links to any homes on the site. Uh, there was a couple post that that I miss that we're in a classic to magic area that has linked again to this wrong bank site, but they weren't supposed beyond that at all.

Hm, no pirated games on these forms were allowed, and i'm trying to think so. Team executor wasn't actually selling anything on the site. They've just link to places like the venu or you could buy IT from. But still the team execute stuff mostly enabled your device to be able to play parody games and do actually have priority games on them except for one device. Yeah the OK but the true blue is um a sticks full of parody .

games yeah and that that is true uh about what the true blue uh those are basically uh for older systems uh the P S one, the say agents, the converter sixty four um so you had a so .

you had a line in your head of like go hold on a second. Is this discontinued game or not? Yeah, I guess there's no other way to get .

IT other than to buy IT IT to go here. We we we didn't sell the devices on the on the mexico website。 We talked about IT um IT IT was up to you to find the devices. I did profit off with me either.

so I guess I should talk about where the characters of this story are at this point. So gary moved from his hometown in ontario, canada, to the dominican republic while he was doing all this. And the ad revenue that he was making from max console I com was enough to support his lifestyle down there.

He was making about forty thousand dollars a year, and this was his main job and source of revenue. For about nine years, max, a million was living in france. Any idea how much max was making off of these products .

that was selling really? I mean, people come up, estate and stuff attended themselves, came up and estimate, uh, they estimated around five hundred thousand s sex. Uh O S licenses were sold at the time. So you can think of five hundred thousand times h twenty five for the license fee and that's not on the hardware that a peer peer often so that that's not counting the gateway three years they are reading out of devices.

Then twenty twenty came along, the pandemic happened and gary was in the dominican republic.

What happened to me is on september the twenty seventh um I was looking forward to wake up that day uh because where was living was in dominic republic uh and we were under cover IT locked down for the longest time uh when cover hit to many public, the president, they put the country into basically martial law.

You couldn't be outside your house after five o'clock at night, and you couldn't leave your neighborhood, couldn't be more than ten people into a grocery store， pharmacy or a bank. Those with only three things, they are allowed to be open. Everything else would shut.

Uh, IT was total lockdown. In fact, so hard that where I was living is like I couldn't even leave my my apartment and and go into my little office ahead, which was right next door. So I actually broke hold with the wall and said, I have going to be able to walk outside and walk in so I could actually work at night. So I was looking forward to sometime in the twenty seven because that was gonna the end of the lockdown.

The airports are gonna reopen um you'll be able to go outside and all day long the bars be open again, the beaches to be open again IT was gonna the end of the the extreme lockdown? So I was looking forward to IT but five in the morning and said that waking up, uh, at seven the morning and and going outside and enjoying outside five in the morning, I woke up with shock and point to my head and a bunch of people on my place. At first I thought I was getting robed and know what was going on.

There was a lot of crime during cubit, and all I know is i'm getting dragged on my house early in the morning. And as a bunch of people in the place looking at all my electronic grabbing, all the the computers, I tried to talk to them to find out what's happening. They refuse to talk to an english or spanners and acted as if I was speaking russian or german, looking at like each other.

Wo is this guy talking? Even when the girl that out that I knew lived above may came downstairs, they even didn't tell her what's going on, that we're just saying eyes is, uh, taken. Uh, they have a paper checked.

Uh, and once as papers get checked will release them. So they took me out there, prompting to the interpol office. I SAT down on a coach. We still continued to refuse to talk to me. I was screaming that I want you to talk to the canadian government.

And after about a day of deciding on the coach, the next day on the twenty eight, they drove into this cage and the middle of nowhere of a bunch of other hatin ts that they had rounded up and blooming in there. And I spent like two or three days in that cage, still not knowing what's going on. Luckily I got a little bit of food from someone else.

I got food brought to the another hate and old guide that a pity on me gave me some of his shared with me because in the making the public when you go to jail um you'll get fed. Your family has to show up and bring your food otherwise you did starve so I spent like three days like that. Come october, the first to take me a little the cage and they said, were taking you to see the canadian government will find, about time someone listen to me, but instead they drive me to the airport.

I start yelling and streaming at the airport again. I think a where where is the canadian government? Well, they can't make IT.

You can find out when you get back home, they handed me my passport. They had at me three cells and pcs, they hand me a plane ticket, toronto. And they said, once you're on the plane, you get the canada, you can figure out you have to leave the country.

A well, I to arrest is, no, you arrest you being take over the country. Their visas expired in, not welcome anymore in the country. So, well, I want to talk and can you go?

I said, no, you can talk to the wing, a land. So I got on the plane. That was one of the first airplanes after the cobi lockdowns ended.

So IT was just patched with people. IT was unreliable, able amount people on the plane. IT flies against a new jersey, and that has to land a new jersey real full again.

And then IT would take back off and go to toronto. But after nine and eleven, any time in airplane lands in america, everybody has to get off scandal passport before they get back on the airplane. Before in nine and eleven, you just sit in the terminal and what they call a transit area. He didn't actually enter the country course the moment I can my passport in new jersey. That's when a digna and I got taken to secondary inspection.

And from there I was told all I was actually going to be arrested and they drove me to the exact county, uh, jail, which was the nearby jail FBI drove me there and said, you're gone to stay here overnight and then we're gna take you to where your cases I still don't know what are being arrested for. What is anything about. A tober the second came um I get read by rights by a judge over the telephone uh when I was in county jail and that's when I found out I had thirteen stuvic charges on me with money living wreford and bypassing a technology measures and all that.

They take him to jail. He stays there for five weeks. They take him to another jail. He stays there for three weeks.

He finally sees the judge and they ask him, hey, are you guilty? You're not gary and he's like, these charges are crazy. I'm not guilty.

Now at this point, the prosecutors have to gather more evidence on him. Gary's name, a max council forum, was simply gary O. P.

A. And that name was easily linked to his company that sold texas international parts in one thousand. And so was very easy to figure out who gary was.

He made no attempt at hiding what his real name was. So when intendo wanted to come after team executor for the assets pro stuff, they came right after gary, but he wasn't the only one caught openness. Let me read the titles you of the FBI press release.

Two members of notorious video game piracy group team executor are in custody. The other that was arrested was maxim million. He was arrested while on vacation in tanzania, but he somehow convinced the police there that his arrest was illegal.

And guess is what the tsa eum police agreed, and they let him go quickly. He called a friend who had a plane in south africa, and they flew the plane to him, and he hopped on IT and flew back to france. Along on the plane, he posted a picture on instagram saying that he's flying alone on a ten person private jet.

But when you have to go, you have to go. Apparently he's untouchable in france by U. S. authorities. The FBI cannot seem to get him arrested or extra died IT there.

But they were able to freeze some of his bank accounts and crypto currency counts that were within fbs reach. And there was a third person listed on this entitled to a chinese guide in chin. My guess is that he was overseeing the production of the chips in china, but since he is in china, he is unreached by the F.

B. I. So he was never detained or arrested six months. Go by for gary sitting in a prison in seattle.

And then come April ah I get more paperwork. I end up getting suit specifically buying a tender and an actual lawsuit. And by then I actually had lawyers working for me.

So then we had to work, worry about civic lawsuit and the criminal al lawsuit, the criminal charge and the civic lawsuit. So they had the two going back. And fort .

nintendo a was trying to sugary for intellectual property infringement and wanted him to pay them ten million dollars in damages.

But how that comes up with that figure is going back to a tender. The experts testified that they estimated around five hundred thousand licenses were sold. And their expert testified that their study showed that when the system is hat that people buy two point for one less games, so is, let's say, the top ten games sell the mario card, super mario stuff like that.

All of those top titan games, two point four, one less sales. So when the system is hacked, someone will buy maybe only seven games for eight games, not full ten games. So they take the five hundred thousand times to two point four.

One times value the game, fifty nine dollars and ninety nine cents. Come around seven, two million. There is then three people in the entitled, me, the guy in china and max. So my share of IT being fashioned one third, but this round IT off to ten minute, which is usually the max you can get in a washington state anyway, for a civic lawsuit.

Did you try to fight that and say, actually, um I think that's this proportion of what I was actually involved with yes.

I looked at IT uh about fighting IT. Uh, I discuss that with my lawyer like, well, let's fight their studies. Let's Spike their estimates and basically they reply back would be, well, we're only giving you a beer minium a five hundred salad is probably more uh, license is sold and we're just talking about the switch.

We're not talking about the gateway three dius. We're not talking about the classic two magic. We're not talking about all other devices. Um we're just talking one thing that uh, got done now you want to fight that them all add in the millions of uh gateway three years devices were solved and and all the classic two magic devices were so and that figure out then multiple into well could been into a one hundred million, two hundred million, maybe more.

So with that information, you said, okay.

find yeah yeah fine. What is capital ten million? Forget about IT.

So gary ows intend to ten million bucks. He's in his fifties now, and his only job is ever had for the last twelve years is gone. So it's just impossible to pay this back. He'd have to make over five hundred thousand dollars a year for the rest of his life to pay this off.

One side was settled, though the key was to settle the civic one first and then there was a lot easier to work on the criminal side. And by then the FBI was the they knew they couldn't get other uh cold defense into the country. Uh other of victims were not coming forward.

Uh play station h someone didn't care about the true blues, saying according care true blues. But there is only the ten electrons of victim. And E S also at representing some of the uh other smaller software developers that may have god affected. They were only two victims left.

This is interesting. So the fb, I went to the to SONY and said, hey, we we caught the guy who was selling pirated video games. You want to be part of the law suit he said, no, we don't want anything to do with IT.

That's really crazy. They want not interested. And the P. S, one was a failure on their part anyway.

When he was being sold for nineteen, nine and nine IT was disaster. Um the P S one mini, yeah the P S one mini. So they were not really interested in and flying lawyers down and and presenting evidence. The only people that were interested in and was a tender in the E S A. There were only two people that showed up in february for assistance to give victim, in fact, statements.

okay. So um the D, M, C, A laws were on your plate.

Yeah, that was the only thing I couldn't get rid of. If I hadn't collected any money at all, I might have been really get away with that. But uh, IT still was the hard part getting up around that nothing I can do about.

And I was already spent a couple years in jail by now anyway. So what can I do? I wasn't couldn't get that time back.

So you have pleaded guilty to those charges.

those charges because I knew the maxim of the judge giving was five years and the government went in to the session hearing on february with that saying he needs to get a full max of five years uh but my lawyer fought back with saying, well, uh, he went through a hard time with cove IT because of that the product people recommended forty two months and my lawyer was trying to go for twenty years, basically time surf but then the judge turned around as well. I can't just give him time serve because I have to send a message that people that do this crime will face hard time. And i'm going to agree with the probation and say, forty months and on top .

of the four months, the judge also demanded that he pay four point five million dollars and retired tion, which ending at all up, he's gotta pay fourteen and a half million dollars and spent three years in prison for what he did.

And I don't like that the judge set out loud that he wanted to make an example of, gary, does that kind of thing really work to pick one guy you caught and give him a brutal punishment just because you can catch the other people that we're doing? IT, I don't know. Based on what i'm hearing here, ten million dollars is already too much of a punishment for what he did.

Now a judge said, no, no, no, no, that's not enough. You need to pay an extra four and a half million dollars more and go to prison for three years. On top of that, is this sentence fair, or is a cruel? And if the judge saying things like, let's make an example of this guy and gives him more punishment and he deserves, then isn't that the definition of unusual punishment? Now, gary is not A U.

S. citizen. He's a canadian. Theoretically, if he's not living in the us, he doesn't have to make payments towards to a federal crime.

But intendo does not want him to slip out of paying them. So they put into the civil case that one, his wages will be gonigal. That is, anywhere from ten to thirty percent of every paychecks earns goes automatically to ninth endo.

And two, that this is enforceable bylaw in any country that intend do has an office which they do have an office in canada. And three, he cannot declare bankrupcy to have his civil fine removed from his dead a while gary was in prison. He already started making payments .

towards all this. Yeah, correct. I was in prison once, say that sentence. I was unable to get a job in prison. I was working in the education apartment, running a library and stuff, and wasn't paying much, was being twelve, twenty five hours a month. But some of that percent had go towards by four and a half million of the reason I had to be done.

Matter what? Well, if I refuse to do that while in prison, then the prison could turn around and refuse to give me my good time or uh, my first step back credit because I wasn't a violent crime and there was no actual victim as a person, uh, human being, just a company. For every month I spent in jail, I can get between ten to fifteen days off.

So that was able because of am a good time, I was able to get out after thirty month getting released in march instead of, uh, waiting until july or some time of in twenty four. I didn't have to do the whole forty mouth. I got ten months in total.

He got out early in march two thousand and twenty three. But since he wasn't U. S.

Citizen, he was detained immediately by ice and spent two months in an nice facility before being flown to toronto. And well, that we live for a long time. He didn't have a place to go. But lucky for him, he was able to find a friend who could put him up on his couch until he can get back on his feet. Gerry has some health problems now what's physically hard for him to get on his feet?

Actually a while in prison he got interested about being a freight broker and is hoping that he can get trained up on that get a job in that um he hopes that someday also returned to the the mini can republic to and he's just trying to rebuild his life from scratch. He's really, really, really just starting at nothing slowly trying to make little progress every day towards having a stable life again from maxim million. He's still out there in the wind, but not particularly on the run.

He's living very comfortably in france, and he posed pictures to instagram all the time. Where is going on, trips to the beach and different french landMarks. And these photos appear like he's living in a luxurious life, but he does seem to be confined to only stay in france.

He knows that the F, B, I is looking for him, and he's just waiting for things to cool down. I have a theory about him. No, it's just a wild idea. But during his heyday, when he was making the most amount of money through team executor, as when bitcoin rose the highest and he did have some crypto currency accounts. In fact, in one article I read um his cyp to assets were frozen but IT wasn't clear exactly which wallet or what accounts.

My theory and opinion is that he probably had some extra gypt to currency stored somewhere that didn't get frozen and IT grows mightily during this time, and he just cashed out at the right time, which is giving him a nice, comfortable life. But that's just my thing. He might have other business ventures that he working on to, but for now he's just trying to lay low until the heat is off him and who knows what is next idea he is after this, I doubt will be so brazen though, because if he has to go to prison again, it's onna be very different than when he had to go to prison in the nineties.

When you use Younger, i'll keep my eye out for him. See where ends up in a few years and how is intendo doing on this fine summer's day? You may ask, okay.

Well, I was curious too, and since there are publicly training company, they share their profits openly for anyone to seat their profits. For the last year was three billion dollars, three billion just in profit. Nintendo seems to be doing fantastic, but they continue to wage war against their own players all the time.

In the last few years, nintendo has been trying to put a stop to people playing in super smash brothers may lay tournament. First of all, this is a game that's twenty years old was for the game cube. But people are still really into IT.

But nintendo doesn't like that players are staging tournaments to play super smatch brothers mainly, and have sent season disease letters and even throw more legal action unless tournament get cancelled. They think that what they are doing is protecting their brand. But it's when in those situations sets like cut off your nose despite your face sort of thing, the more they fight with their own players.

The worst brand gets. One of my favorite childhood memories ever was getting an intendo for my birthday and opening IT up and playing IT with my friends during my whole birthday party. Decades later, I still remember which friends were there at that party, what games we played, who was good at IT pick, any other birthday I had as a kid.

And I can tell you a thing about IT, where I was or who was there. But this one I remember because in hindu brought so much joy to me as a child that day. But now that i'm older, I can see now that intendo has a lot of growing to do still.

A big thank you to gary bowser for coming on the show and share the story with us. Gary has set up a go fun me to help them get back on his feet. You can find a link to that and so much more in the show notes.

If you like this episode, I have two more suggestions you really should listen to you. Episode ninety two is called the pirate bay, and it's one of the most popular episodes on the show. And IT may just make you think differently about piracy. An episode forty five is called xbox underground, another very popular one, and it's about video game hacking. But the story that is around IT is so crazy that you just won't believe it's true.

So go check goes episode that if you haven't already, this show is made by me, the swingy tank jacky sider editing help the episode by the fashionable asset interest and ledger prox recorded the of and did the mixing for our music is by the mastery ous breakfast mater cylinder. I played minecraft for the first time in the other day. Want to know what I think about IT? It's a block lister and it's ground breaking. This is darkness diaries.