can a crack affect an antivirus engine?

I search for a thread with a similiar topic and I didn´t find it, as a paid user of an AV product I want to know if is posible (I don´t know if i´m breaking a rule of the forum) to have an answer for this thing.

Browsing the Net I saw different opinions of people complaining for the performance, detection, inestability and removal capabilities of diferent AV products, people that didn´t buy the AV, they applied a crack or patch (or however they call those things nowadays).

Moderators of the forums said that applying a crack can damage the antivirus performance of a computer, because it modify the code of the software to enable all the functions permanently, and that could be the main reason of those issues.

Now my neighbor likes to use cracks and all that stuff, and when we talk about AV or any other shareware software, he complain that all software should be free ( he´s not a linux user XD ).. so he use a crack for everything, I want to convince him that pay for the products is better and you can avoid infected files or damaging your pc.

I hope that somebody can explain this topic to me.
Regards.
Sorry if i made a mistake in my writting, English isn´t my first language

 

I am not capable of providing expertise yet my bets are on YES [used to play with these things, so just out of experience]

 

I would never consider touching the stuff with so many great security solutions available for free or at nominal cost.

 

I think that just affects the activation mode... But a other hacking attempts can't be ignored.

 

Using cracks for Anti-Virus software is stupid anymore. With how many giveaways you can find of companies giving 1-year keys out for their software legally why would you go and break the law to use the same products you could have gotten without breaking it?

 

>> Using cracks for Anti-Virus software is stupid anymore.

Nothing to add!

The main problem is that any tampered code may cause an instable product
or other effects like a new sleuth for malware. and in process of an update
all is gone. All this happend with a known product with 4 letters, here supported.

Some people are such focussed on that stuff they lost reality and they were blown.
ok, there are other options - but those have to investigate every single day
some work to be "legal" - they should investigate that time for other improvements.
anyway there are enough options to be free and legal and those products
really improved in the last years.

 

It's always amazed me how some folks trust those nice crackers to have complete control over their security software,it must be great to have such faith in human nature.

 

Avoid cracks or cracked version always. Crackers for antivirus are useless and risky. They might change/tamper some function(s) (other than activation). I still remember a cracked version of Avast! Antivirus 5 was released with rootkit (Avast Blog). Always use genuine versions downloaded from original vendor site. Either use genuine key/method or trial, but do not be fooled by crackers/malware authors. You want protection against malwares, not to be infected with unknown rootkit gifted to you by malware author(s).

 

and this is the only opinion you will hear from any moderator. to be completely honest about this, modifying the code is not necessary leading to problems. it all depends on who is writing the patch, if he knows what he's doing (and if he doesn't have a hidden agenda).

but, using a pirated software isn't moral at all. people worked to make that software and this has to be respected. nowadays you can also use freeware, which is pretty good also.

 

Crackers are just happy when they patch some software. It's a challenge for them.
Nothing more to it.

 

Theoretically no, it shouldn't affect. But doing so turns a software into an unpredictable software that can die anytime without warning.

 

Depends on the AV being taken coz take example of Norton's TrialReset which first requires Norton's tamper protection to be turned OFF and then the crack kills the norton's process and then restarts with your trial as resetted back to 15 Days or 90 Days but in case of avast's v4.8 there was one keygen I remember where you have to just select avast's product (Workstation, server...) and it would generate the serial and then avast would be activated

I know incase of avast it was a keygen but not use of crack but it definetly helped in bypassing avast's procedure of serial registration

 

I used to crack software for others myself, and i never did anything bad to them, they worked completely normal and even did updates without a problem. I don't do it anymore but can say that most are fine, just scan with Virus-total before you install and if its clean then you have no problem. I don't endorse cracking software as a buy all my stuff now

 

today you can crack almost anny AV but i dont Recommend to do it,

 

I've seen and read a lot of infected Kaspersky AV/IS cracks and installers which include TDSS, Virut or other nasties. So cracks are quite risky, and many times they won't even work how they should. Some rare ones do work and don't include any malware though.

It's much wiser to just either use free software (there are so many of them) or pay for something. Also you can often get paid products for free by giveaways, I used to use KAV for 2 years for free just with giveaway licenses.

 

@Rampastein: Kaspersky AV/IS 2010 crack/patch is common which bypasses blacklist mechanism. None of the crack works for 2011 version. It is also up to developer/vendor to protect its code.
Giveaways are good but Kaspersky giveaways are rare. Since 2006, KL own sponsored giveaway was only on Windows 7 launch day. I do not remember any other giveaway sponsored by KL itself. Since yesterday, BitDefender giveaway is running. Other vendors also host giveaways. If giveaways are common, why people will search for crack/patch.

 

I would say it depends on the crack. If it is a keygen or trial reseter or license file, I don't think it would affect anything.

 

People resort on cracks and other means for the very reason that they aren't aware of the any other alternatives out there. Take an example here in India Norton and Kaspersky are very much famous rather than BD and Emsisoft or even PrevX or HMP which are far lesser known here so people either rely on Freeware(avast,avira or avg) or simply use apply TR to nortons and kaspersky

 

I guess TR do affect the normal code

 

I don't know where the OP is from but in India I have heard people are not well paid and that is the main reason to bypass programs' code using cracks (incl. trial resetters). I mean people don't have enough money to pay for all the product and their way of thinking about intellecutal property is different from the one of other people all over the world. Another reason - no law prohibition , corruption , etc. Using cracks and being a cyber criminal in the USA is one thing , being the same in Macedonia - completely different.

 

Guess you have heard some wrong things people do have enough money here but its only thing is that they are not very well aware about certain softwares(virtualization, sandboxing...) and infact for smooth working of any normal user's computer only a basic and up-to-date AV,OS and timely backup is more than enough rather than use of HIPS, virtualization and other techniques of protection

 

Please , accept my aplogies!

From what I see on the Internet and on TV/mass media , you are absolutely right . But I have few friends who have visited India and they told me that . They may have just been in bad place .

Please , accept my sincere aplogies!

 

To cracks I would say no (why take the risk?). Serials are not dangerous, but I would say no to that also if you can buy the product (or are aware of a free alternative)...buying a product makes you feel a lot better... I heard .

 

A cracked Av is already potentially compromised in my opinion?

 

Some keygens install rootkits on your system, I can't recommend these ones A text file with an illegal serial number should be ok