Brazilian stores charging less than $100 to pirate ten PS4 games - report

PS4 piracy is becoming a major issue in Brazil, according to local reports.

Brazilian game retailers are reportedly offering pirated games for sale, quite openly.

According to Portuguese-language site UOL Jogos, which purchased a bundle of pirated games to verify a retailer's claims, consumers have to hand over their PS4 to the retailer to have the games copied onto the console's hard drive.

The retailer has to temporarily connect hardware to the console's innards, voiding the warranty, but when the games have been copied this hardware is removed. The only lasting effect is a second user profile.

UOL Jogos was able to purchase ten pirated games utilising this service, at a cost of $R300 (less than $100 at current exchange rates). Since purchasing ten games at Brazilian retail prices costs about $R1,700 ($560), it's a pretty tempting offer for local gamers, and one that's apparently being taken up in great numbers.

We won't go into details of how the piracy is performed, for obvious reasons, but it requires very little initial outlay and not much effort from stores providing the service. It's a different technique to the well-known game and account sharing exploit, which Sony is said to be cracking down on in Brazil.

UOL Jogos contacted Sony to report the matter and even offered up the hacked PS4 for investigation, but has not received a response as yet.