PS3 second-hand clampdown is "false speculation" - Sony

A report from website GamesRadar claiming that it will be illegal to sell used software for the PS3 has been officially denied by Sony today, with a spokesperson telling GamesIndustry.biz that it is "false speculation."

GamesRadar yesterday reported that Sony was warning high street retailers that the sale of pre-owned games would be illegal due to the licensing terms of PS3 software, which would mean that discs technically remained the property of Sony.

However, a Sony Computer Entertainment UK spokesperson today outright denied that any such message had been conveyed to retailers - telling GamesIndustry.biz that following conversations with the firm's European parent company, neither division has "any knowledge" of such a strategy.

"We have definitely not been communicating that," UK spokesperson Jennie Kong confirmed. "It's false speculation. We don't have any further knowledge about this topic - either officially or unofficially, to be frank."

It would appear that the report is based on the resurrection of a much earlier rumour in this regard, which surfaced most recently last November with claims that PS3 software would "bind" to the first machine it was played on, and would be unusable on any other system.

At the time, Sony completely debunked the rumour - telling UK newspaper The Guardian in no uncertain terms that: "PlayStation 3 software will not be copy protected to a single machine but will be playable on any PlayStation 3 console."

Speaking to us this afternoon, Kong confirmed that "there has been no official comment on this since the story that came up a few months ago - it hasn't changed since then, and we're quite surprised by why this has popped up again, to be honest."

However, this is one industry urban legend that just won't go away, it appears. Sony has been attached to various efforts to stamp out the second hand software market ever since a group of Japanese publishers failed in their efforts to have the used-software trade outlawed in that territory, but the company has consistently denied that it plans to use invasive DRM-style measures in this way.

With the firm already making massive gambles on factors such as the price point of the system and the popularity of the Blu-Ray next-gen DVD format, it's perhaps unsurprising that it's not keen on gambling on removing used games - often cited as a key factor in driving the mass-market acceptance of gaming - from the equation as well.