Unless I’m missing something, the only reason Adobe even could disable your pirated Photoshop is if you haven’t blocked the application from accessing the internet in your firewall. C’mon, that’s basic stuff. =)
I also blocked “%ProgramFiles% (x86)\Common Files\Adobe\Adobe Desktop Common\HDBox\Adobe Update Helper.exe” just in case that had anything to do with it also, not sure if it matters or not, just was fed up wtih reinstalling.
They check the license key hasn’t been revoked via a DNS lookup, but not at install time, so often the user installs, uses, then miraculously finds it disabled a few weeks later; then runs to find a new copy/keygen and the whole situation starts again.
(e: they also route the DNS lookup via bonjour if it’s running, so you have to keep bonjour segregated from the internet too, which can cause other problems)
Maybe I went overboard, but I went through every Adobe exe that was installed and setup firewall rules blocking them. I notice that some of the ‘sattelite’ programs they claim are required for proper running remain in task manager after the main program is closed.
Not just out of caution for Adobe meddling, but also… there’s no such thing as a free lunch, my assumption is that the ‘free’ pirated software cracked by a ‘friendly’ Russian will be doing something nefarious… and it probably won’t be as obvious as coming from eg After Effects.exe
Unless I’m missing something, the only reason Adobe even could disable your pirated Photoshop is if you haven’t blocked the application from accessing the internet in your firewall. C’mon, that’s basic stuff. =)
Yeah I haven’t been bothering recently, I gotta be honest. The m0nkrus releases are just too easy haha.
Is the hosts file hack still worth doing, or just go into Windows Firewall and take away its internet access?
Just create an outbound firewall rule for the Photoshop exe that blocks internet access. That way it can’t phone home.
I also blocked “%ProgramFiles% (x86)\Common Files\Adobe\Adobe Desktop Common\HDBox\Adobe Update Helper.exe” just in case that had anything to do with it also, not sure if it matters or not, just was fed up wtih reinstalling.
Can also just edit the hosts to redirect any outbound connections from adobe to the local network.
They check the license key hasn’t been revoked via a DNS lookup, but not at install time, so often the user installs, uses, then miraculously finds it disabled a few weeks later; then runs to find a new copy/keygen and the whole situation starts again.
(e: they also route the DNS lookup via bonjour if it’s running, so you have to keep bonjour segregated from the internet too, which can cause other problems)
Maybe I went overboard, but I went through every Adobe exe that was installed and setup firewall rules blocking them. I notice that some of the ‘sattelite’ programs they claim are required for proper running remain in task manager after the main program is closed.
Not just out of caution for Adobe meddling, but also… there’s no such thing as a free lunch, my assumption is that the ‘free’ pirated software cracked by a ‘friendly’ Russian will be doing something nefarious… and it probably won’t be as obvious as coming from eg After Effects.exe
Sadly, they do license key checking via a DNS lookup, and not all application-level firewalls block DNS.