As an extension to their recent tightening of the Xbox Live ship, which began with region-locking content, Microsoft has begun to ban certain Xbox 360 consoles from accessing Live altogether. "Modded" units will no longer be allowed to use the service, and will receive the error, "Status Code: Z: 8015 – 190D" should a connection attempt be made. This error applies to the console itself, and not to the accounts therein – so gamers can still make use of their Live accounts on other units.
Microsoft has stated that there will be "a no tolerance policy towards inappropriate behavior like hacking or cheating," and that this policy is "an important part of our efforts to try and maintain a fair gaming environment for the large majority of gamers that play by the rules." They also went on to cite the release of the Halo 3 beta as an important reason to add this sort of lockout.
Besides providing gamers the opportunity to take advantage of online opponents via various programs, modified consoles are capable of doing many not-so-legal things. These include ignoring region protection, running all manner of homebrew applications (like emulators), and playing pirated software. (oh,no!)
As is usually the case within the modding community, Microsoft’s actions will inspire new and better modchips, which will in turn necessitate greater measures of security to be implemented.
The war has begun.
