When hackers at last years Chaos Congress unveiled the method with which they had ascertained the PlayStation 3 master key, it was immediately evident to most that the PlayStation 3 had just been irrevocably hacked. The master key, after all, allows any bit of code to pass itself off as officially Sony-sanctioned code. Worse, the key is hardcoded into every PlayStation 3, so Sony cant just change it. That means that every existing PlayStation 3 can be jailbroken forever.

Since the master key was released, Sonys gone through a lot of trouble to try to take the pee out of the swimming pool, as it were, famously suing the hackers who discovered the master key. Everyone knowledgeable about security, though, knew the only thing Sony could do was issue new hardware that uses a new (and better encrypted) master key.

It now appears thats exactly what Sonys in the process of doing. Following some recent price drops around the PS3, an anonymous source close to Sony now says that the console maker is deep into plans of developing a new, hack-proof PS3 system, presumably using a new master key.

According to the report, he hack-proof SKU will be a PS3 Slim containing a 300GB hard drive. That hard drive is meant to be the incentive to upgrade, since the new system will cost about $299 when it is released which is exactly the same price as the current 160GB model.

Sonys best hope against piracy at this point is getting people to replace their PlayStation 3s a tack Sonys taken before with their hacker-friendly PSP. My guess, though, is a bigger hard drive at the same price isnt going to entice many hackers now getting their entire game libraries for free.