It's an accepted way of life among techno-wizzes. Company creates software; hackers hack software. Company upgrades software for more security; hackers hack upgraded release. The cyclical pattern continued today, as Sony has released the latest edition of firmware for the PSP, v2.01, for download on its Japanese Web site. Sony's US site for the PSP still only has version 2.0 available. However, North American users can reportedly upgrade to v2.01 now by using the "Network Update" feature on their PSPs.

The new patch apparently doesn't add anything significant in terms of functionality but is instead a response to the potential security issues raised when an amateur programmer found a weakness in version 2.0. The downloadable patch is currently intended only for Japanese PSPs, and there is no word yet of games being unplayable without this latest version installed.

While the crack of version 2.0 was not intended to be malicious (the author of the crack said, "This release wasn't intended as a way to run pirated software on the PSP. We believe that everyone should be able to compile their own code and run it."), it appears another group of PSP users isn't so kind. Web site and PSP watchdog PSP Updates is warning PSP users that a fake patch has been circulating the Net, and the faux update does nothing but render the handheld useless.

"For anyone who has seen a 'patcher' floating around the net by PSP Team. Its [sic]fake. It will brick your PSP and will void your warranty," reads a message on the site. It should be noted, however, that PSP Team has not been tagged as the creator of the file and could be the victim of a frame job.

One of the team members who found the security hole in Firmware 2.0 disassembled the binary and found these messages in the file's code:

"Your 2.0 is hacked please reboot. Thank you PSP Team the french team. F*** yoshihiro and SonyxTeam Looser." (Editor's note: "F***" replaces an expletive.)