How can you call something that locks up a system a hack. Anyone can code something that would cause a system to severely slow down or lock up if given enough system priority. Annoyance yes, Hack no.

A hack is something done to annoy, harm, and steal. Think of it as slowing down a huge website, and stopping trafic to it. It's still a hack. Hack aren't just programs to steal your information, or delete your files. Remeber that.

"A hack is something done to annoy, harm, and steal. Think of it as slowing down a huge website, and stopping trafic to it. It's still a hack. Hack aren't just programs to steal your information, or delete your files. Remeber that."

Ok, so If I write a flash app, and in that app I accidentally had a button on it that when you press it, it calls a script that runs a cpu intensive calculation in an infinite loop, or calls a function in the flash player that my work fine on my windows machine but when on the wii it causes the system to lock up (bug in the flash player for the console). I publish this on a webpage not realizing this bug exists. Did I just hack your system?

BW, I think "control of the system" or "unauthorized access" is the benchmark I think you're looking for. A "hack" isn't necessarily either one of those things even though you would say "a hacker gained access to the bank's mainframe and stole all the customer data". Freezing or crashing a system is controlling it... kinda. Not very sophisticated or useful but still a successful attack.

"hack" actually doesn't even necessarily mean anything nefarious. In a very literal sense all programmers and engineers are "hackers".

Is not! hacks are done for a reason, I mean it's one thing to crash a wii (monor annoyance), and annother thing to write a code that will crash a corp server and make a company loose millions of dollars in business and repairs. Last I checked crashing a wii does no harm, makes nobody loose any money, and actuially happens anyways when you go to some sites that it just dosnt support well.
Its only a hack if information is being stolen, or productivity is delayed. I think symantec is just trying to make a case to make antivirus for consoles now that PCs are generally secure enough to not need it and their business is being eaten by microsoft.

Even if it's still not a hack, it is a problem that should be fixed. Perhaps this "hole" could be used to get data off the system or do something worse?

Actually, it impacts all version of Flash plugin. This mean it also happens on Mac and Windows (FireFox included).

I think most of this article mentions how it's a bug, which is true, which alllows for hacking.

"I think most of this article mentions how it's a bug, which is true, which alllows for hacking."

Actually no, The article is mentioning how Symantec is trying to play this off as a security flaw/Vulnerability for the console. Which implies that there is a risk that the system could be damaged or compromised in some way. Which is not the case. Its just a bug in the flash player that causes the system to lock up. Its a bug that simply needs to be patched by Adobe, and then the browser redownloaded.

As Caeden is saying its Symantec trying to drum up a need for Antivirus Protection.

It's not a hack, it's a clitch. No identity
compromise or no permanant system corruption. It's
just a temperary clitch.