Pirated Starcraft II Wings of Liberty .EXE Files Infected with Malware

It has happened to both Windows 7 and Office 2010, and many other pieces of software, and now it’s the turn of the recently launched Starcraft II Wings of Liberty. Microsoft has warned that fake Starcraft 2 files associated with illegal, pirated copies of the game from Blizzard, contain malware, with downloads from various sources including BitTorrent trackers and warez websites serving as vessels for the malicious code. Some gamers will undoubtedly turn to torrents or other examples of file sharing networks looking for free Starcraft 2 downloads now that the title is officially available. However, they should be aware of the risks that their actions imply.

[Dance]

good enough for them

[pangitkqb]

Don't freakin' steal.

[MasterChief3624]

Effing pirates. The cancerous organisms that are eating virtually every industry out there from the inside, out.

[electricshadow]

Wonderful news. Pirates deserve it. They're the scum of the gaming industry.

[jaosobno]

Actually the real scum of the gaming industry are greedy developers and publishers that produce subpar games and then charge insane amounts of money for them.

Or developers that split, what should have been an entire game, into 3 parts under excuse that "it will be a better experience". How? How is buying 1 game 3 times "a better experience"?

[ApexHell]

the two expansions which will be priced as expansions probably 40$ a piece are no different then what broodwar was for sc1, each one has there own campaign and each one will have there own ladders for multiplayer since multiplayer changes and enhancments will occur.

its not the same game 3 times.

[Awookie]

Dude have you played the game? they made it with storytelling and immersion in mind, the premission Hub (being able to go to different parts of the ship) wouldn't work if they had all the races.

And Starcraft 2 is not subpar at all amazing production values and game balance.

[radphil]

@hellmetal789

So if you want to have the full MP experience we need to shell out ~$140?

And they stated they'll be full games, not expansions, which means chance are they'll be $60, considering the amount of money they spent and are still spending on the production values.

Granted these pirates got what they deserve for not only pirating the game, but also not even checking behind themselves.

Also I find it funny that people on here are just close minded into black and white. Some people actually download games to try them out (surprising right?). Hell for example a friend of mine allowed me to try out Minecraft Alpha, and now that I actually had the chance to play the full game, I bought a copy myself.

~$13 for the game before it goes beta, in which i suggest everyone to check it out fyi.

[kevnb]

if only we could kill gamestop, piracy and game rental services.

[Ilikegames76]

for pirating the game is that they're going to try it first before buying, there's a demo out for it. There's no reason to pirate a great (IMO) game. Diablo 2 was so good for me that I bought two copies just to play with GF, now my wife.

[Darkfocus]

there's is no SCII demo that I'm aware of..

[ApexHell]

there are two 7 day trial keys that come with every game sold.

[Darkfocus]

why wouldn't they just make the trial available to everyone?

[IdleLeeSiuLung]

Yeah, what's up with that. Why wouldn't they make the trial for everyone? Are they afraid people will use multiple accounts?

[steve30x]

What good is the trial keys when not everybody can get them. Thats not classed as a demo. A demo is a freely available piece of a game that is available to abslutely everybody instead of relying on getting a trial key from a friend.

[ultramoot]

This is not news. Lots of pirated games in the past have been reported to contain viruses. Half of them turn out to be false alarms, while the other half stems from the stupidity of people not checking the authenticity of the file with other people first. Go to any torrent website and read the comments. They'll tell you which file is clean and which is fake. Besides, the reported torrent will be removed by the site admins within 12 hours.

“Another interesting file we saw is "StarCraft.2.Wings.Of.Lib erty.CLONEDVD-WW TRAINER.exe"

Oh please, a trainer is programmed to read your keystrokes and manipulate the game memory to give you God Mode, Unlimited Ammo, etc. during the game. That's why it's called a 'cheat program'. Only amateurs complain about trainers containing trojans.

[Darkstorn]

Starcraft 2 is a big enough release to justify buying the game. Honestly pirates, don't you want to play online multiplayer?

[steve30x]

I bought the game for offline mode only. I will never play the game online. Online gameplay is not for everybody you know.

[Thecraft1989]

I know why would you pirate this and lose the best part of the game campaign is amazing but multilayer is apart of the experience of the game and its not like pc games are expensive as consoles as the lack of royalties to eg Microsoft,Sony,Nintendo if it was console game I only payed £60 for my collectors edition.

[thrust]

no sh*t sherlock,if you want a game go buy it.(hope it wipes out the pc)

one of the reasons the gaming industry is moving to kids and family games is because they not pirate download games.

downloading cheap b*stards are killing it for everyone else like allways.

[Demonsdown]

Wrong they are going that way because it's a bigger demographic to sell to. And those people don't whine and bitch on forums all the time or start flame wars over what console is better.

[lucifon]

SC2 is one of the best games of this year. A genuine copy deserves to be in every PC gamers collection.

[nickjkl]

star craft 2 was released 3 days ago you know

[lucifon]

Your point being? By this year I meant this year so far, theres still some great titles to come thats for sure :)

[Beahmscream]

I won't lie, Ive pirated a game before. That being said, Starcraft 2 deserves to be bought.

[SlxTeN]

i would only buy a single player version of Starcraft 2, dont care about online play. But single player version dose not exist.

[steve30x]

What rock are you living under? There is a single player game in StarCraft II. Its not online only.

[Raoh]

bought my copy on the first day it was released..

[reznik_zerosum]

I downloaded starcraft 2 from pirate bay ,and its working ( campaign ,custom game ,challenges...everything except battle.net - that will be fixed soon).
Its hard to install (if u are God of war/Gears of war noob) , but sure beats 69$.
I never pay for a game in my life and i will never will.