Almost two years after fail0verflow released the PS3 root keys that the security of Sony’s console is built around, a group calling itself The Three Musketeers has released the even more vital “LV0” bootloader key. After fail0verflow’s exploit, Sony released a flurry of updates, culminating in firmware 3.60, which changed the bootloader to hide the other keys inside LV0. Now that the LV0 key has been released, unsigned and unauthorised code can potentially be run on PS3s that have updated past the 3.60 firmware.

This is a major setback in Sony’s continued attempts to keep the PS3 from being used in unintended ways by owners of the system, and could represent the turning point in an ongoing war against the platform’s security.