Software cracking can be defined as modifying a program with the intention of making it behave in a particular manner and not the way it was intended to behave when it was created. Cracks are used by pirates to make their pirated games and movies work without validation passwords and other restrictions.

The basic process

Here are the basic steps involved in cracking :

• First the program that is to be cracked is run and its standard behaviour is observed carefully.
• Next, the program is opened up in a disassembler. Disassembler is a cracking tool that is used by the crackers to reveal the coding of the program.
• The typical strings of character that appeared in the program earlier is spotted in the code. Specific attention is paid to the occurences of key terms such as password, expired, date, etc.
• Then, the protective routines of the program are learnt by following the code closely.
• The program is then opened up in another cracking tool called HIEW (or Hacker's View) to make changes to the dissassembled code of the program.
• Changes are made to the code such that the program's restrictive or protective features are disabled.

In doing so, the program now behaves very much like an original version. The program has been cracked.

Please note that this is only a very rough outline of the cracking process. We have omitted the technical details of the process.

Disclaimer: This information is provided only for educational purposes. We do NOT encourage any form of cracking as it is illegal and infringes the rights of the owner.

Reference

Software cracking
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_cracking

Neworder - Computer security portal
http://neworder.box.sk/