I understand that sharing video, photos, documents etc. is relatively safe because the data is not executed in the processor as instructions. How come people are willing to download and install pirated software though? How can one be confident that it does not contain malicious addons? Are people just don’t know the risks? Or are there protection mechanisms that I am missing? I mean since the software is usually cracked there is not much use in comparing checksums with the originals, is it?

We are seeing on our corporate network lots of browser hikackers that connect to c&c and are used in botnet DDOS as a service. Once you install x software it sets up a persistent service that keeps modding chrome.exe etc

Firewalling the .exe that you installed does nothing to stop the calls to c&c

b1ab
link
fedilink
English
11Y

Fair point. Malware can tunnel through existing comms, thus firewalling the exe would do little to protect you.

That’s why I recommended a multilayered defense and practicing good opsec.

An exe that installs a service, modifies unrelated executables, and sends comms through an unrelated application would be a catastrophic failure in any good defense.

If your system is this wide open then you’ll be likely to have all sorts of problems from non pirated software. Such as freeware that installs adware.

I have tried to find these in the wild to no avail.

Unfortunately the machines that get infected are not fully controlled by us but they get networking and internet from us (space rental in the building), so we isolate them as much as possible and we black hole all the bad traffic on the router level.

Our machines all have EDR and strict security policies. Not much gets past that.

b1ab
link
fedilink
English
11Y

Right on. Gotcha.

Piracy: ꜱᴀɪʟ ᴛʜᴇ ʜɪɢʜ ꜱᴇᴀꜱ
!piracy@lemmy.dbzer0.com
Create a post
⚓ Dedicated to the discussion of digital piracy, including ethical problems and legal advancements.

Rules • Full Version

1. Posts must be related to the discussion of digital piracy

2. Don’t request invites, trade, sell, or self-promote

3. Don’t request or link to specific pirated titles, including DMs

4. Don’t submit low-quality posts, be entitled, or harass others



Loot, Pillage, & Plunder

📜 c/Piracy Wiki (Community Edition):


💰 Please help cover server costs.

Ko-Fi Liberapay
Ko-fi Liberapay

  • 1 user online
  • 116 users / day
  • 280 users / week
  • 1.01K users / month
  • 3.51K users / 6 months
  • 1 subscriber
  • 3.39K Posts
  • 82.1K Comments
  • Modlog