Welsh Man Arrested, Fined for Modifying Xbox Consoles

UPI
07/05/05 8:49 AM PT

The unidentified man was sentenced to 140 hours of community service and ordered to pay US$1,300 in costs. The court also seized three computers, two printers, three Xbox consoles and 38 hard drives.


A 22-year-old man in Wales has become the first person in Britain to be convicted of modifying copyrighted video game consoles.

The unidentified man was sentenced at Caerphilly Magistrates Court to 140 hours of community service and ordered to pay US$1,300 in costs. The court also seized three computers, two printers , three Xbox consoles and 38 hard drives, the BBC reported today.

The man had been selling modified Xbox consoles fitted with a hard drive containing 80 games, and chips soldered to the console's main circuit board to bypass copyright controls.

The man was selling the modified consoles on his Web site for $450.

He was tracked down by an investigator working for the British games industry trade body, the Entertainment & Leisure Software Publishers Association.

has to be fake. The only problem i might fint in the modded xboxes he sold that he had games on them. But it shouldn't be illegal to mod your boix. Afterall, you payed for it... Fair use i think is what it's called.