Most antivirus I tested, even the paid ones, are so annoying with popups and complaining about cracks that I just take the risk and go without em

    • BearOfaTime@lemm.ee
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      4 months ago

      Cracks modify executables…classic malware/virus behaviour. Almost the definition of malware.

      Which is why windows uses a file protection system since at least XP

    • 0xtero@beehaw.org
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      4 months ago

      Enterprise antivirus products have had PUP (Potentially Unwanted Program) category forever. Seems its categorized as “HackTool” so not malware.

    • MrAlternateTape@lemm.ee
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      4 months ago

      Not at all, a crack does something to an executable file that you use. Malware would do the exact same thing.

      • dactylotheca@suppo.fi
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        4 months ago

        But you generally want that crack to do something to an executable. Do antivirus etc. tools just heuristically flag everything that looks like it modifies an executable? Lots of legitimate dev tools do that too, so it seems like it’d give a lot of false positives, but I haven’t used Windows in ages so 🤷

        • MrAlternateTape@lemm.ee
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          4 months ago

          Well, how is the system supposed to know that you want the crack to do something to that executable? The anti virus just sees something is happening and flags it. It does not see a difference.

          • dactylotheca@suppo.fi
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            4 months ago

            I definitely get what you mean, I just have no idea if antivirus tools flag anything that looks like it modifies executables. My edit to the comment you’re replying to may not have propagated to your instance yet, so here’s what I added:

            Do antivirus etc. tools just heuristically flag everything that looks like it modifies an executable? Lots of legitimate dev tools do that too, so it seems like it’d give a lot of false positives, but I haven’t used Windows in ages so 🤷