https://www.dsogaming.com/news/denuvo-5-2-anti-tamper-tech-used-in-newer-games-has-already-been-cracked/

I'm assuming this isn't the same initiative started by GoG but a random group of crackers using the logo. I am rather worried how this will look to publishers on GoG - I'm hoping none of them associate GoG with supporting piracy.

Don't worry, they'll do that anyway. :P

The thrilling game of whack-a-mole continues. In today's era of misinformation? Abandon all hope.

Hell, people already associate DRM free and GOG with piracy before the FCK DRM movement was officially a thing. There is no hope.

When I pledged to Dean Dodrill on Twitter that i'd personally buy 20 copies of Dust if he released it on GOG, I immediately got a slew of responses along the lines of "Yeah, you mean pirate it and give it to 20 people right".

I hate people sometimes.

Yeah. I provided my GOG receipt for Hollow Knight when I made a bug report on the Steam forum and got told "maybe if you buy the game it'd work", and STILL got called a pirate. It was pretty amazing.

DRM being cracked quickly can only be good for GoG. It removes the excuse for games not being released here, since the pirated Steam version is already out there. The fact that publishers don't recognize this already and just do a staggered release on GoG a month or two after Steam is something I don't quite understand. It would only make their customers happy, and realistically it shouldn't require that much effort on their part if they plan their release in such a way.

Honestly, I admire these people. The amount of talent and dedication they have to have to be able to break these things seemingly without much effort... Hackers in general are some of the most talented IT people out there.

That's what I'm wondering.
I don't doubt they possess immeasurable talent, beyond words, but Denuvo is being cracked so quickly whenever it shows up, I'm wondering if they actually require any of that talent for this? :P

It's a virtual Maginot Line. Oh sure, it looks daunting and impressive, until you realize you can just walk around it. :P

Wot, another GOG apology in the making? ;p

Though not as creative as they used to be.
Back in the day they not only cracked copy protections, but also created some nice loading graphics which often was better than the actual game graphics.

Anyway, I'm not sure how GOG & powers behind feel about this, but seriously, didn't anyone think that FCKDRM might one way or the other be a bad name for DRM information site.

I guess no one saw this coming, but had they named the site "DRM Information Hub" or whatever more boring, I don't think any warez group would have used that.

It adds publicity to the 'FCK DRM' initiative.

(And they even added competing game distributors to that page - didnt expect that...)

1) Itch.io doesn't really compete, as they have games that GOG simply rejects. I guess Double Fine games are pretty much the only overlapping titles between the two.

2) Itch.io isn't even a DRM-free store. About 99% of their games probably doesn't have DRM, but a small number actually does.

Anyway, be that all as it may, it is somewhat surprising that they actually included those other stores.

I can't speak for the state of affairs in the last few years, but a long time ago when I did some related work there were a lot of payloads in the most popular "distributions."

It's the perfect venue for establishing a botnet, much less simple remote access. People who torrent generally keep their machines online much more than others, they may not notice much slowdown in connection speeds (especially if they keep their torrent client up), and, for that matter, often are rather technically illiterate.

Not saying there aren't people getting their kicks from solving such technical problems as DRM (and, honestly, fuck anybody contributing to it), but I suspect the presence of quietly-backed private or state players is pretty high there.

I remember a game on steam with it's entire soundtrack encrypted in a single file. It didn't take me long to realize it was the 3 letter version of the company name as an Exclusive OR key that simply repeated over an OGG file.

The problem with things like this is that, ultimately, they often end up using the same techniques with slight modifications. You can't imagine that you'd spend years developing a new scheme for encryption and such only to have it cracked in half the time, then suddenly develop an entirely new method.

That's not to say these people aren't talented on either side, but, frankly, it's a loosing battle.
That's still going on, and even worse now. I had a kid a few years back tell me how he made a huge botnet: went to the pirate bay and uploaded his "RAT" under the name of the newest movie. Did they care that it was an EXE file? Nope, they not only downloaded it, but didn't delete it when they noticed it didn't work.