A potential class action lawsuit against Microsoft has appeared following the recent spate of Xbox LIVE bannings.

The Abington IP, a boutique law firm specialising in consumer class actions, posted a form on its site for disgruntled Xbox 360 users who were banned from the LIVE service. The site asks users to post their details and take part in a class action lawsuit against Microsoft if they were not "refunded a prorated sum for the time left on your subscription". The potential action has arisen following Microsoft's  comments reiterating its ban policy and zero tolerance approach to piracy. The explanation on the Abington site reads: 

As has been reported widely in the media, tens of thousands of Xbox owners have had their modified Xbox consoles banned from Microsoft's online gaming service Xbox Live. Although modification of Xbox consoles is against the terms of use for Xbox/Xbox Live, Microsoft "conveniently" timed the Xbox console ban to occur just after the release of the new Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 game and less than two months after the release of the very popular Halo 3: ODST game. This "convenient" timing may have resulted in more Xbox Live subscription revenues for Microsoft than it would have generated had these Xbox console bans taken place at some time before the release of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 and Halo 3: ODST. Additionally, sales of both Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (published by Activision) and Halo 3: ODST (published by Microsoft Game Studios) would likely have been greatly diminished had the Xbox console ban occurred prior to the release of these games.

The logic seems slightly flawed in the explanation but it's being suggested that Microsoft wanted to squeeze a couple more months of subscriptions from known offenders before the bannings. Make of it what you will. Thanks to Blackbeard for the tip.

Comments

Asteria (1) Posted: 03:41 on 19 Nov 2009

If I had been caught and banned for modding my xbox with the intention of running pirate software the last thing I would do is add my name to a legal document. Might as well walk round with 'thief' tattooed on your forehead.

warrka (2) Posted: 04:11 on 19 Nov 2009

it doesn't matter when the bannings took place. you broke terms of use and code of conduct and got what you deserved. people that pirate games totally disregard the years of work that are put into games and i don't feel any remorse for the people that do get banned. the judge will most likely say the same thing or close to it. i think Microsoft is doing the right thing and punishing bad people.....if you get arrested in the real world for stealing you'll go to jail and that is basically what is happening here modders and pirates suck and they deserve what they get and this lawsuit is proof how stupid they are

BaZa (3) Posted: 12:09 on 19 Nov 2009

I had to chime in here. I agree that there should be a class action suit because a lot of people that did no modding of any kind were banned accidentily. The problem with this suit is that they are requesting part of the xbox live money back. No gamertags were banned, meaning they still have access to xbox live, just not through the banned console. With a new console purchase, they can access live with the same account. They need to get their facts straight.

SIL3NT-DE4TH (4) Posted: 13:03 on 19 Nov 2009

well. what happens if u bought a refurbished xbox from lets say Gamestop. Does gamestop know its been modified. maby, maby not. does the person who bought a modified xbox form them know its modified if game stop dosent. I would have to say no. some people got banned for haveing a modified xbox they bought form gamestop. thats bad. for thoes people there should be A potential class action lawsuit

hipa76tia (5) Posted: 14:30 on 19 Nov 2009

Hello - I totally agree those who deserve to be banned should. I unfortunately just got a new 360 elite console on 9/1/09. Anyway- I have not been able to connect xbox live ever. I was troubleshooting like every week with xbox and no luck. Finally - yesterday I got a message stating console is banned and we have never even gone online with it. Long story short- gamestop customer service states under the serial # i have - they see another purchaser in 1/08 which is so strange. Therefore, now not gamestop or microsoft wants to help me out. So frustrating......Therefore gamestop is not thoroughly checking the consoles they sell and it sucks!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :(

undeadjeeves (6) Posted: 14:57 on 19 Nov 2009

I too have to agree that pirates should be struck down by the ban hammer, but like hipa76tia said, I think Gamestop is a big part of the problem. What they need to do is not only confirm that the system works and can play a game when a unit is brought in for trade-in, but they need to start testing the Xbox Live connection as well. If the unit has been banned, then it won't be able to access Live. Seems like a simple enough test to me. At least this way, they won't flood their trade-in stock with systems that can't get into Live.

BaZa (7) Posted: 15:28 on 19 Nov 2009

I can't see Microsoft winning this battle. You can't ban all these consoles and not offer some sort of recourse o way to dispute it for people that have legit systems. I know if I spent $200-$400 on something that was disabled by the manufacturer for no fault of mine, I would be livid and wanting to sue.

Valas Azuviir (8) Posted: 17:34 on 19 Nov 2009

Unfortunately, that is part of the risk of buying something second hand. You buy a Ford at a second hand car dealer and the brakes fail, whose fault is it, Ford or the car dealer? Same thing here really. As Jeeves pointed out, Gamestop should be checking if the console in question is still Live active, before they purchase it and set it up for repurchase. They're the ones buying shoddy merchandise and subsequently passing it on to the next unsuspecting dupe. Yeah, it's easy hating Micro$oft, and often it's very warranted, doesn't seem to be the case in this instance though. As for the whole modding/hacking thing, modding is one way to get around regional locking, least if I've understood everything correctly. So, say you're an JRPG junkie and can actually read Japanese, well, prior to modding you couldn't play your imported games, after modding you can. I can see their pov, just as I can see Micro$oft's with regards to the piracy issue. As for hackers being bad, some are, some aren't. I wouldn't call the chaps who showed that ModWar2 still had the software backbone for Dedicated Servers bad guys myself. Sometimes you got to bend or break some rules in order to see some justice done, that's just the way the world works. Course, there are plenty of hackers whose motives are less altruistic or ideological and more materialistic or malignant. So yeah, I would consider those to be bad folks.

sinfuljosh (9) Posted: 13:35 on 20 Nov 2009

To the first couple commenters so quick to shoot this story down. AND to the writer of the story there is more to it. As writing on the class action site. Additional *reported* problems resulting from the bans include, but are not necessarily limited to: * Disabling/altering Xbox functionality *NOT* associated with Xbox Live or piracy (HDD functionality for example); * Disabling/altering Xbox functionality *NOT* associated with piracy (Netflix, game add-ons, music, and arcade games for example); * Obtaining information from Xbox consoles without permission of the owner; * Other problems/consequences associated with these bans have been reported here and elsewhere. I can vouch for this. I have two systems. One is modded and one legit. I have duplicates of some of my games that I am legally allowed to make as a single copy under the DMCA. I have this setup for one reason. Game makers have decided they can make more money by removing 4 person split as an option. (hello!!! 80" projection and i cant 4 way split on one console?? ) So i system link and dual split screen the copys never leave the house as they cant play elsewhere and yes I do buy an original and make my copy myself. Not to long ago my 1st gen non flashed finally RROD and it was out of warranty. I was biding my time for the MW2 LE console until then and played on my flashed. Yes it got banned. (again it wasnt really bought to play on live. only mce and system link (was bought used and im not dragging my gtag back and forth. ) So since i now had no console. MS would not give me an actualy reason only a link to some FAQ that i never agreed to like I did with the Terms of use. They have also disabled things that do not require net access and correpted game saves. I was able to get a live refund until I got my MW2 console but only upon threatening to use the TOU against them as these lawyers are doing. They are not asking for a new console or money for their banned console. They are asking for a cancelation and refund of unused time of their live acct.

maestrolb (10) Posted: 16:27 on 23 Nov 2009

I believe that any commercial rights to games should be honored as people put hard work into developing them. However, ask yourself why games are pirated: the amount of time and effort and associated costs to achieve this is huge. So, if the millions of sheep out there continue to pay inflated prices to fatten the coffers of Microsoft and others, piracy will continue. Reduce the price to a reasonable level, and piracy will all but disappear. That goes for PC software as well. Food for thought?

ace90099 (11) Posted: 19:21 on 20 Jan 2010

First off yes Piracy is against the law but when "whoever" decides that a game like "Halo: ODST" should be $60 instead of $30 there is just cause to pirate games or at least that game, I don't care how you look at it, if the game designers, publishers or just the stupid company that gets royalties decide to get greedy and rip off the people that are actually willing to pay for the crap they put out then they deserve to have everything stolen from them. Its just how the world works. Second, I agree that if you break the TOS then yes you should be banned, but only banned, your console should not be made non functional(as sinfuljosh stated) just because you broke the TOS, this is illegal. Third: If you are not going to be allowed to mod your console then restrictions like region locks should not be placed on them(I have no clue why region locks even exist other then to make consumers waste more money.) As to what maestrolb said, its not completely true that piracy will go away if stuff is cheaper just look at the itunes app store, but if stuff was more reasonably priced then yes more people would just buy it instead of pirating it, because piracy requires work(sometimes hard work) and money(sometime a lot and sometime not that much at all) but I have yet to see any company fail because of piracy alone I mean just look at the PSP, every single model(except the Go, for now) has been hacked to play pirated game and yet Sony keeps releasing new ones which get hacked and game companies keep on making games for them.?.

ace90099 (12) Posted: 19:33 on 20 Jan 2010

Also, the PSP is a perfect example of why people NEED to hack game consoles. Features included with PSP play umds or download games save games play movies play music internet? features added to hacked PSP play umds or downloaded games or rip umds and play from mem stick save game, save game state, in game cheat program, screen shots. play movies play music, in game music universal remote(psp phat) rip old psx games and play from mem stick(even the dreaded multi-disc games) graphing calculator(TI-83 emulator) play nes, snes, etc. roms. internet? the list goes on and all these features can be added for free. Now if you ask me I would much rather have the second list of feature(even if it didn't include pirating games) especially since it costs the same for either.