PlayStation 5 reportedly jailbroken in less than two years since its launch

In what could be defined as a major development, Sony's PlayStation 5 has reportedly been jailbroken. As per Twitter user Lance McDonald, the console has finally been jailbroken running on firmware 4.03. McDonald is known in the PlayStation Homebrew community for releasing an unofficial Bloodborne patch that allows players to run the game at 60 fps on the PlayStation 4.

The PlayStation 5 was launched on November 12, 2020, and has since taken the gaming market by storm. So far, the console has been able to maintain strong security stats, ensuring all bugs in its software are reported through the PlayStation Bug Bounty Program.

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Everything about the PlayStation 5 Jailbreak

Lance McDonald, via his official Twitter handle, posted a clip of him using the PlayStation 5 to install and run fake PS4 packages on the system. He was also able to access the Debug Menu from the settings, in which the scene appears to be a sign of a successful jailbreak.

The jailbreak is seen running on firmware version 4.03, which was launched back in 2021. Presently, however, the version 6.00 firmware is live and isn't jailbreakable.

This exploit relies on the Webkit vulnerability as an entry point, thus implying that it will run on any PlayStation 5 console - Disk and Digital - versions running the firmware 4.03.

As per the developers who executed the kernel exploit on the system, there have been reports that the version might be usable in previous editions of the firmware, but is next to impossible in the updates following 4.03. It is also suggested that at the moment, the console has only a 30% chance of successfully being exploited, as it will require multiple attempts to get it working.

This exploit, however, is limited in many aspects. As of now, this jailbreak only allows read/write access to third party applications and doesn't provide them with 'execute' access. This is due to the inability of the hackers to dump the kernel codes of the console since accessing them causes a 'Panic' in the system and leads to a system crash.

Thus, it won't be possible to launch any third-party packages, but it does provide access to the Debug menu, which contains a host of tools and settings. This is especially important for developers to derive further statistics and control over the console.

PS5 Debug settings (Image via Wololo)

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The PS5 has been a huge success among gamers and PlayStation fans alike. Despite its underwhelming launch due to limited stock issues, the PS5 is presently one of the most used gaming consoles globally.