AVG Says Most Game Hacks Are Crawling With Malware

[Mithcha]

ESET didn't like AVG either. Also saw fit to obliterate it.

Harharhar somehow that doesn't make me like ESET any less. Not like having 2 AVs at the same time is ever a good idea anyway, suppose the strongest one survived here.

Oh I know. I was scanning my dads computer and had thought I'd shut AVG down, evidently ESET found something it didn't like. I say 'obliterated it', it's really the wrong term. It sort of sliced and diced AVG for some reason, took it apart and deleted some bits but left others intact. Still don't know if it just had a vendetta or if it genuinely found something.

 

[Weaver]

The problem is cracks are often detected as malicious code, because inside them they're doing things considered malicious... to get around the game's copy protection.

In 4th year university AVG was picking up my buffer overflow attacks for our Computer Security class malicious code.
Arguably, it was, as you could gain remote root access on a linux machine if you ran it, but it wouldn't infect anything or install malware.

Regardless, filestube is completely chock full of malware, so yes, you're going to find malware there.

 

[Callate]

90% seems high. I don't think "people who want to hack games" as a whole are such a target-rich environment that hackers would be falling all over themselves to get their personal information. And from what (admittedly limited) I've seen of the hacking sub-culture, many hackers who engage in this kind of work want people to use their software- it's a kind of fame, a kind they don't get if their work attacks the users' computers.

Remember the story of Remedy using a hacker's work to crack their own copy protection when Max Payne 2 went to Steam? Just because some of these guys aren't strictly on the up-and-up doesn't mean they're united by singularly malicious intent or don't do skilled work.

 

[Luca72]

In high school I used to pirate games pretty frequently, and I suppose the amount of sites that are just a front for malware is pretty high. So I guess you do run the risk of getting a virus if you happen to be a moron. Nearly everything is reviewed though - all you have to do is do ten minutes of research to find the best crack, or find a reliable site. If you go to a site that is only for game cracks, and has too many z's or x's in it's name, then yeah, you'll probably get some malware. It bugs me when anti-virus companies make statements like this, where they assume everyone who buys their product is an idiot who will emotionally respond if you make them think they're under attack.

 

[yamy]

Is this the same AVG that identified my legally bought copy of To The Moon directly from Steam as a virus?

Yup. I have total confidence in that 90% number.

 

[Mromson]

The 90% statement is probably accurate. However the vast majority only download from the remaining 10% because they're not fucking morons. You can quite easily tell if a file is bullshit ("CoD5 Crack.exe"? LETS RUN IT!).

 

[Vrach]

Of course. But then again, most of the internet is infested with malware. It's just that anyone with something other than a gentle breeze flowing between their ears usually has enough sense not to visit those sites because:
1) They're obvious as hell as to contain malware
2) There are trusted alternatives to almost all of them

With that in mind, while most of the game cracks might be infested with malware, these are the cracks you'd find by searching "[game name] crack torrent" and jumping over the first 10 pages. On the other hand, there's this site called something like The Bay of Pirates which I hear is quite popular, that has a system for marking trusted uploaders. If you were to check those cracks, you'd find they pretty much never contain malware.

There's also the matter of game cracks identifying as viruses. This isn't to say they are viruses, but the antivirus, like AVG, sees them as such because they're modded .exe files, which it finds suspicious.

If you take all these factors into account and add a dash of sense, you'd find that number unworthy of being identified with the word "crawling". In fact, it would hardly even fit the term "once in a blue moon".

edit: for clarity, as I know mods here come down on piracy first chance they get - this is a collection of facts relevant as a response to the article, not an endorsement of piracy.

 

[Matthi205]

AVG and Avira both mark all cracks as Trojan horses instead of actually scanning them, even if they're clean of such things. Which is bloody annoying when you're trying to get a really old game to run that has DRM like Starforce and the only crack you can find is from some forum... I had this with Colin MacRae 2005 and I was in luck, but others might not have as much of it.

On another note, TPB is not as free of viruses as you might imagine... but anyway, why am I complaining? I never use it (except as a last resort).

While we're on the subject of cracked games: Why the hell does my legit steam version of Saints Row 3 delete all my saved games suspiciously regularly, while my Skidrow cracked version doesn't?

And on the subject of game hacks: that sounds pretty true. But then again I never use hacks. Console commands and the Car spawner in San Andreas are the closest I've ever come to game hacks, so I have no real idea if this is true.

 

[Cid Silverwing]

Did we really need a shitty anti-virus company to tell us that "hax" are chock full of viruses?

This is as basic as you can get when it comes to modding/hacking.

 

[Greni]

I always put on my ski-mask before I facerape someone and DDoS attack sites. Such a hacker lol.


Anyway, I was going to be so clever informing all the ignorant peasants why this 'news story' is bullshit but got beaten to the party by nearly everyone here.

Picture of another participant in the hacker Olympics:

 

[Baresark]

All applications will show up as malware or a virus because they all modify the data stored on your HDD. When you install an application and say yes at the security window, you are giving it permission to do that. And one of the things it does besides install is allow it's program/programs to get past the security by automatically putting itself into the accepted application list. So when you have a crack it is not automatically entered onto the OK list and you have to manually allow it to access and "modify" the information on your HDD which includes things like making registry entries which directly affects windows.

Nice try AVG.

 

[WOPR]

I can believe it... Mostly because (if you look) most people that download the more legitimate hacks/cracks generally all congregate to the same websites. Because we TRUST them. (see: thepiratebay)
But in an ever expanding internet of course some people who don't know better will go to things like "iminent" or "xhack4u" and get their computer killed in a manner of moments.

But yeah just throwing a statistic like that out there will scare people or make them laugh because too few look at the bigger picture of it. And with so little explanation of course people will get mad. It's like releasing a statistic saying "90% of water you buy is more expensive than gas" people won't believe it because they have water at home and you fail to include the statement "this 90% is when you buy BOTTLED water"

 

[Strazdas]

AVG is a pretty solid anti-virus, but let's leave mod-hunting to the mod-hunters, mkay?

sorry, let me stop laughing for a minute.......
AVG is the antivirus that is know for identifying false positives as viruses and compeltely ignoring real viruses. its one of the worst antiviruses out there and i havent seen a computer with AVG that didnt have a virus on it yet.



Also letsn ot forget that due to modern punkbusters and such 90% of hakcs needs to insert themselves directly into memory of the game, which is exactly the smae process that viruses use (sometimes even the exact same method is copied from viruses for easy programming), which raises plenty fo red flags for antiviruses. "oh no its breaking into this program, it must be bad" when in reality it must break into that program. been there, fought Avast for that, and in the end Avast did an update de-flagging the file as it was safe.

Thank god I had Avira as a backup, even now using Avast! my computer is running better than when it did with AVG.

Avast is great. in fact tests show the free version of avast to be better than many paid antivuruses, including AVG moneygrubbing version. When i started using avast i have never caught a virus since that, it always stops it beforehand. Same cant be siad about norton, avg, or god forbid Panda (we all remember the scandal when someone infected Panda servers and Panda downloaded a virus with update right?).

 

[loc978]

In related news, AVG and many other anti-virus programs are getting false positives from both executables involved in running The Old Republic.

I really have to laugh... until some asshole makes anti-virus programs necessary for Linux users.

 

[FalloutJack]

*Sigh*

That's strange... When did I ever show you my computer? Oh wait, never. Well then, I'm sorry but I can't take that opinion. It would be false.

 

[Strazdas]

*Sigh*

That's strange... When did I ever show you my computer? Oh wait, never. Well then, I'm sorry but I can't take that opinion. It would be false.

Well, as i havent seen your computer, the point still stands.

 

[Headdrivehardscrew]

Funny, as right now, I am analyzing and fixing a family computer that somehow got ransomware and a bucketload of malware on it... while AVG was supposedly doing its job. Not cool.

I agree that a lot of shady software out in the wild (and on specific sites) is little more than malware in tempting disguise. I do not condone piracy and cheating. I don't think no-disc patches are inherently evil when used in conjunction with original software, though. The legitimate buyer of software should not be made to jump through fiery hoops when pirates can do whatever they please.

The real issue here is that search engines are being played like the harpsichord by certain unsavoury folks. You're looking for infinite lives, infinite gold, instant level ups or a very convenient wall hack? Come, come, come this way! You're longing to see Wynona's beaver? Oh, what a coincidence! Come, try this out. You want to watch movies for free? Hey, you can! Just install this 'codec' here, will ya?

 

[Genocidicles]

Even if most of the hacks were crawling with malware (instead of it just being AVG being stupid as everyone has already said), I think the risk is far outweighed by the reward of not having to put up with bullshit DRM.