The Xbox was a modders dream after it was cracked, enabling the console to be used for anything from pirated games to a file server. In the wake of this Microsoft had promised us that the Xbox 360 would be secured "at the silicon level", apparently making it very difficult to crack and the results even more difficult to replicate on multiple consoles.

Well in South Korea they're reporting a booming trade in modified Xbox 360's which allows copied discs to be played in the consoles DVD player, and Microsoft has gone from talking up its vaunted security to downplaying the piracy. The company is promising to fix any bugs such as this with patches and updates pushed through Xbox Live, reminding me somewhat of Sony's farcical ongoing back-and-forth with the homebrew crowd on the PlayStation Portable. One would crack the system, the other would release a patch, this would be cracked a few weeks later, another patch, rinse and repeat.

At the moment times are good for South Korean pirates, where the modification costs around KRW 70,000 (60 Euro); and pirated software is said to be readily available for as little as KRW 15,000 (12 Euro), compared to the standard retail price of around KRW 40,000 (33 Euro), says Gamesindustry.biz.