Seems like Sonic Team is getting serious with Phantasy Star Online hackers and pirates. Following a series of mishaps, including the hijacking of a live event, the developer is introducing a ‘three strikes’ penalty policy on offenders.
According to the new rules, if the studio has said that if you end up with two or more offenses whilst playing the online RPG, then your account and security code will be deactivated – rendering your Dreamcast disc useless.
From the sounds of it, Sonic Team may be working in these punishments on a retroactive basis, meaning that if players have been naughty up until now, they could be in trouble. At the moment, this new policy is only effective for Japanese players, but no doubt this will be introduced to Western players too soon enough.