[Velocity]

Originally Posted by gattsta

From what I've heard, they took down the network because of custom DEV firmware being distributed to Sony users. They were installing it on their PS3's, putting in fake credit card information, and purchasing a ton of stuff.

They took it down to contain the firmware or something like that i believe.

Not confirmed, just heard from a source (xJawz) one of his newest videos describes what he heard, and it sounds somewhat legit.

Originally Posted by TwilightPrincess

I'd love to hear more on that theory. +1 for possibility of this being a big pile of bs.

The custom firmware was call Rebug, a custom firmware design to enabled many of the debugging features on the PS3. Users noticed that after then change the PSN type from retail to dev, the Shop no longer verified the info as normal users don't have access to this network anyway. It's designed like that so devs and press can download the software without having to pay.

So yes, this much is true. Rebug also allows users on older firmwares to access PSN through the Dev network as the version check was also not used there.