Home Gaming Anti-piracy company Denuvo has filed a lawsuit against notorious cracker

Anti-piracy company Denuvo has filed a lawsuit against notorious cracker

2 min read
19

denuvo

Denuvo is not an especially loved bit of software in the PC gaming community. It’s a bit of DRM that’s been used for a while (though nitpickers will say it’s an anti-tamper system) to a modicum of success, preventing piracy on several new games.  For a while, it seemed like anti-piracy technology was finally on the verge of stamping out the practice – with notable cracking group 3DM saying that by 2018, piracy could be eradicated. Denuvo’s efficacy has waned over the last while though. Where it used to take weeks or even months to crack, some games are now having their copy protection scrubbed within a day.

One of the people responsible for that is a cracker by the name of Voksi. Denuvo’s now taken legal action against him and his cracking site, Revolt.

“It finally happened, I can’t say it wasn’t expected, Denuvo filed a case against me to the Bulgarian authorities. Police came yesterday and took the server pc and my personal PC. I had to go to the police afterwards and explain myself,” Voksi said on the r/CrackWatch subreddit. “Later that day I contacted Denuvo themselves and offered them a peacful [sic] resolution to this problem. They can’t say anything for sure yet, but they said the final word is by the prosecutor of my case.”

Since then, Denuvo’s parent company Irdeto has issued a statement saying that Voksi has been arrested.

“Piracy is a threat that is now firmly established in the gaming industry, and we are focused on securing the content of game publishers and ensuring that hackers cannot distort the gaming environment for personal gain at the expense of other players,” Irdeto Cybersecurity Services Vice President Mark Mulready said.

“The swift action of the Bulgarian police on this matter shows the power of collaboration between law enforcement and technology providers and that piracy is a serious offence that will be acted upon.”

According to that statement, the Bulgarian cyber Crimes unit “can confirm that a 21-year-old man was arrested on Tuesday on suspicion of offenses related to cybercrime and that computing equipment was confiscated. Our investigations are ongoing.”

Piracy may not be as harmful to the industry as it’s made out to be, but it’s still not something you ought to be doing – especially when it comes to the technical side of removing copy protection.

Last Updated: July 26, 2018

19 Comments

  1. Lord Chaos

    July 26, 2018 at 08:47

    Not condoning piracy, but if not this guy there will always be others.
    Shouldn’t this rather be a wake-up call that Denuvo is now obsolete?

    Reply

  2. Atuin

    July 26, 2018 at 10:34

    Denuvo sofware:

    Layer 1: Denuvo
    Layer 2 :VMProtect
    Layer 3: VMProtect + Denuvo
    Layer 4: Arrest the Hacker

    Reply

  3. For the Emperor!

    July 26, 2018 at 08:39

    They need to bring back the days of Demos for games…I am sometimes interrested in a game, but the lack of hands-on stops me from buying it. And I find it harder and harder to go on reviews only. Luckily Youtube Lets Play videos sometimes gives me the info I need, but then there is the threat of spoilers 🙁

    * I have not pirated a game in a long time and I do not plan on doing so again anytime soon. Except maybe Sims 2? I need to sort-of design a home and the real designing software is less intuitive than Sims lol

    Reply

    • Lord Chaos

      July 26, 2018 at 08:47

      This, or I watch Twitch of randoms.
      Demos really need to make a comeback, it will force companies to make quality games again.

      Also: CoD would die out as the game is already demo length or less 😛

      Reply

      • For the Emperor!

        July 26, 2018 at 08:51

        Even those “open weekends” that they sometimes have on Steam works for me. Pity that doesn’t happen often enough with the games I might buy 🙁

        *Though – my Steam backlock is thankful of that 😛

        Reply

    • Guz

      July 26, 2018 at 10:11

      I remember when getting my monthly demo disk from NAG/PC format was the highlight of my month xD

      Reply

  4. Lord Chaos

    July 26, 2018 at 08:46

    Not condoning piracy, but if not this guy there will always be others.
    Shouldn’t this rather be a wake-up call that Denuvo is now obsolete?

    Reply

  5. BakedBagel

    July 26, 2018 at 09:07

    As long as you have the 3rd World and the poor

    You will NEVER get rid of piracy.

    Reply

  6. Jiggy

    July 26, 2018 at 09:11

    Ok so let me get this straight. Denuvo is not doing the job it was created to do, so they rather sue the people who break it apart rather than fixing their redundant DRM inside a DRM.

    Reply

    • Gr8_Balls_o_Fire

      July 26, 2018 at 12:11

      A better solution would be to offer the guy a job.

      Reply

      • Jiggy

        July 26, 2018 at 14:03

        I actually agree there. You want to block a hacker then you hire a hacker that has field experience.

        Reply

        • Gr8_Balls_o_Fire

          July 26, 2018 at 17:10

          It’s glaringly obvious. He has the best experience at finding (and closing) loopholes in your product.

          Reply

      • Kikmi

        July 26, 2018 at 14:21

        This is outright the way you go from black to white hat. Might go to court and then settled behind doors. Well, hopefully if things go his way

        Reply

      • Deceased

        July 26, 2018 at 23:49

        Or wrap a DRM around their “DRM inside a DRM”…

        Reply

        • Gr8_Balls_o_Fire

          July 27, 2018 at 13:53

          And a great first project for this would be Inception.

          Reply

  7. Kikmi

    July 26, 2018 at 10:03

    Nope, right to own has to come into play here. The pricing of gaming lately has rather dampened the piracy rhetoric HOWEVER people that are circumventing digital protection for games are due to (by a very large part) of people not wanting to deal with the likes of uplay, origin and other third party launching software with banal requirements and data harvesting, some games going as far to collect data to increase revenue by mentally manipulating players using their K2D ratios, amounts spent etc etc. This has fuckall to do with piracy as much as it is ensuring their partner groups can eek out every cent out of their client base.

    The fact that these so called “services” are mandatory with no opt in or out option leaves players unable to play on day one due to some ill conceived requirement for SP games to always be online (Hi Diablo), some people are region locked or can outright not play the game THEY BOUGHT due to corporate greed. The people that are actually forking out their hard earned pesos are the ones that are having to feel the brunt of this communistic application of software.

    Let me just add though, I know there is piracy and yes in the 90’s and early 2000’s it was a really rampant scene but the the world has become a global market now with games being made for every price point, from free to thousands of $(tar Citizen) options. Piracy is not the issue here as much as it is to keep the investment boards coffers overflowing

    Reply

    • For the Emperor!

      July 26, 2018 at 10:24

      ” ill conceived requirement for SP games to always be online” – THIS really pisses me off. Diablo 3 was a good example, but get this: NBA 2k18 MyCareer Mode has multiplayer forced in! I had to ease my XBox privacy settings to be able to play the SP mode! One of the many reasons I will not be getting 2k19 🙁

      Reply

    • Lord Chaos

      July 26, 2018 at 10:28

      And then you get games like Evolve, where players have spent tons and some of the servers have already been decomissioned

      Reply

  8. Atuin

    July 26, 2018 at 10:34

    Denuvo sofware:

    Layer 1: Denuvo
    Layer 2 :VMProtect
    Layer 3: VMProtect + Denuvo
    Layer 4: Arrest the Hacker

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Check Also

Crash Bandicoot 4 on PC disappoints everyone with its always-online DRM

Don’t you love being locked out of a game that doesn’t even feature online multiplayer bec…