The latest post from Ryan Naraine and Dancho Danchev's blog Zero day on
Software Piracy leading to higher malware infection rates has sparked a small thread in my thought process. For all that have ever downloaded pirated software (never myself, and never when I was in college), you can clearly understand the statistical information that is being described in the report.
The reason for taking interest in this topic was the thought of how many different avenues a victim is prone to in installing malware via downloading pirated software. As an example, I wanted to draft out a possible situation and all of the possibilities that can arise out of the situation for the possible infection of malware.
User Bob decides to download a pirated copy of Microsoft Windows. Bob knows what pirated software is, and is halfway familiar with the usual sharing tools such as torrents, limewire, irc, usenet, ect ect. Bob decides to search in google for something like "
windows XP black" (a popular pirated version of windows XP). Right off the bat, within the first 3 pages of googles results are a dozen or so malicious sites that have been flagged for malicious use. Lets say bob steers clear of the malicious sites and finds himself on a popular torrent site downloading an active torrent for the software.
A couple hours later, and bob has himself a .iso that he can burn to his favorite media and start the install process. The unfortunate thing about this torrent, is that a serial was not provided. Bob steps over to his favorite keygen/serial site via his arsenal of pirated links or google, and winds up with the possibility of being compromised with malware either via the site the serial/keygen is hosted on or via the serial/keygen file itself. Lets say for shits and giggles that bob manages to steer clear of being infected with malware because, well if he is doing a new install as apposed to an upgrade, what good is malware if it is only installed for an hour or so.
As we continue, Bob is now installing his fresh new copy of Windows on to his local desktop or laptop. Another potential for malware exists with the presence of the malware in the pirated software itself, but lets say for sake of blogging that this is not the case. Now one other issue for the potential existence or installation of malware is the fact that most pirated copies of windows have Microsoft update turned off by default and will never be updated with the latest security related patches. This issue might not exist right off the bat because the installed copy could be up to date on the date of the install, but all future security related issues will pose a problem for the software installed.
Now on to my favorite, the installation of an antivirus. Antivirus are one of the most popular pirated software's out there and also one of the most prone to containing malicious software if downloaded illegally. The reason being, is that if you are downloading an anti-virus, then chances are, you do not have one installed. This is the perfect opportunity (and possibly the last opportunity) for malware to sneak in under the radar without being detected.
However way you look at it (or are infected by), downloading pirated software poses a great risk to the installation of malicious software. Any avenue that takes you into an attackers controlled domain, is setting up the potential risk of being infected. Would I advise you to not download and install pirated software, that is not my problem. However, I will always advise that if you would like to remain malware free, make sure that all of your software is legitimate and updated, and stay off of the 3rd world of the internet (Both of these are broken by downloading pirated software.) You are already at a high of enough risk from being infected from legitimate sites that have been infected.
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