The security system prevents the game from starting. "Removing protection of StarForce of any versions"
So, first of all, why do we need emulation? In order to get a dump, you must at least load the protected program into memory (moreover, into the debugger). This can be done by purchasing the original disc with the game (in our city, I have not seen discs with the games that are being studied here, and in general I have I haven’t bought it for 6 years), or if you have high-speed Internet (I have unlimited 60 Mbit/sec), download the image (MDS+MDF).
Everyone knows well about emulation in DT, now let’s imagine that you sat down in a soft chair, took some tea and cookies, installed a game with StarForce in the hope of having a pleasant evening, launch it, StarForce installs its driver, reboots the computer. Click start game, the disk is checked ,Suddenly:
We click "Retry" - it doesn't help. We tried all the Daemon Tools options - the same thing.
Starforce still burned that the game was running under an emulator. Reinstalling the game and the driver naturally does nothing. The gamer swears at everyone, starting from the author of the distribution on the torrent and ending with the developer of Starforce (they say they read this blog? Greetings to them)
What to do? Crooked image? Disable drives? Reinstall Windows?
Yes, you can try all this, but why if you can think with your head.
Let's think logically, how can StarForce know that the disk is emulated?
He has only 2 ways to do this:
1. Check the type of drive from which reading is being done (if it is SCSI and not IDE, then an emulator is being used)
2. Check the read speed of sectors on the disk, if it does not correspond to the read speed of a CD or DVD, then this means that the image is located on the HDD (in fact, this is not entirely correct - StarForce actually checks the read speed of sectors, but the emulation works fine with images both on a hard drive and a flash drive)
In other words, to solve this problem you should use the following algorithm:
1.If you have Daemon Tools Lite, then we use a SCSI drive. We don’t need DT at all.
If Daemon Tools Pro, then you need to add an IDE drive.
2. While checking the disk, look carefully at the HDD activity light. It should be constantly on, as if intensively copying large files. If it blinks at a certain interval, then most likely the image needs to be remounted on the IDE drive (i.e. install Daemon Tools Pro Advanced, for this by the way Lite version no need to delete - they can work together and use the same driver).
3.The next stage is to change the disk on which the image is stored. Starforce in some unknown way checks the reading speed of random sectors and if something does not match there, then we get a window that emulators have been found. The disk is selected experimentally, for example, 2 work well for me hard drives SATA 750 GB connected to PCI SATA controller VIA VT 6421, as well as when writing images to a flash drive Transcend JetFlash 32 GB
There are not many games that require an IDE drive; the last one I can remember is Worldshift (StarForce 5.50.11.16 Pro). Probably 85% are emulated with a SCSI drive on DT Lite.
Further, the second most popular trick that Starforce offers to dishonest gamers who decide to play a counterfeit game is checking the consistency of the topology, the disk key and the image itself. It looks like this, first we are asked to enter the key:
The key is not sewn inside some MDF, and therefore it must be entered separately. We can see in the Hex editor why the key is missing:
The UltraISO 8.1 program was unable to save the key from the original disk, or it was not there initially. The key is usually written in the distribution or on the forum where the game is posted.
The disk check begins, it takes a suspiciously long time and this is what comes out:
Or another option, but the essence is the same:
Here the root of the problem is the wrong topology ( MDS file). Very often, in distributions of images they put the wrong MDS (for example, in the game Angry, Bad and Sober) and then in the comments literally everyone writes that nothing starts for them. Well, no wonder if you have no brains))
Here we reveal to you a terrible secret, which apparently no one ever knew before SVINOFORCE.
Let's assume you don't have the correct MDS. What to do, how to launch the game? The solution is ingenious: Starforce doesn’t care what game the MDS file is used from - it is in no way tied to MDF. Only the protection version is checked, and if you replace the topology from one game with Old 4.70 to another with the same version, then everything will work. For example, our laboratory personally verified that the topologies are compatible:
Petka 8 - Conquest of Rome (Starforce 4.70.11.3 Pro) and Desperado 3 - Skirmish on the Prairies (Starforce 4.70.10.0 Pro + SFFS)
Worldshift (StarForce 5.50.11.16 Pro) and Angry, bad and sober (StarForce 5.50.5.1 Pro + R6002 bug)
Sometimes the following error may appear:
Everything is simple here - unmount one of the images.
Finally, the StarForce disk check indicator has reached the end and this indicates a successful check:
An interesting feature is also that when loading a game via OllyDbg, the disk key must be entered even if it is hardcoded in MDF. And of course, use the Phantom plugin to hide the debugger from the protection module (in fact, only the window name is checked there, i.e. .ie if HWND="OllyDbg" then error output).
These are the tricks. The SVINOFORCE team continues to work hard on researching the protection of Zvezdosil, but for now it’s late and time to go to bed.
See you all again, don't forget to write to us by email about your developments in the field of disk copy protection research. Oinks, grunts, everyone!
Downloaded it a week before release more people than the original licensed copies were sold in the first days of the game's appearance on store shelves. This is how online piracy is affecting the gaming industry today. This may seem surprising at first glance, but piracy hits the gaming industry harder than the music industry, since the financial situation of the gaming industry is much more precarious.
This precariousness lies in the fact that the game project “recaptures” the lion’s share of costs in the first 2-3 weeks of sales. If, “thanks to” hacked pirated versions, First level sales are low, the game is almost certainly a financial failure.
The abbreviation "DRM", which stands for Digital Rights Management, immediately brings to mind an "arms race" between pirates and developers who want to protect content from hacking. Of course, hacking security computer games pirates have much great knowledge than pirates releasing music or movies. To successfully hack a game, you need a whole organized group, some of which remove protection, while others distribute products on the Internet or publish them on pirated disks.
Previously, competitions between groups of pirates to see who would be the first to release a game were of purely sporting interest, but in Lately Of course, financial support comes to the fore. And when hacking protection like StarForce, pirates pursue purely financial goals.
Often the video game industry overestimates the impact of piracy, believing that each download of a game can be equated to a loss of revenue from one copy sold, or even from several copies sold. On the other hand, some users download or buy a cheap pirated version to try, and if the game turns out to be worthy of attention, the gamer also buys a license to clear his conscience. But whatever the motives of gamers, piracy is a serious problem.
The global video game industry generated nearly $8 billion in revenue last year. The figure is impressive, but we should not forget that the margins in the video game industry are such that companies cannot afford such large losses as, for example, the music industry experiences from online piracy. The only thing that eases the suffering of the gaming industry: games are much larger than music, so stealing them over the Internet is not so easy. Especially in Russia, where fast channels access is not yet widespread enough. While many users collect entire libraries of stolen music on their hard drive, this is no longer the case with games.
Colin McRae Rally 2005 is protected by StarForce.
But it also has its own characteristics. The video game industry is quite quick to respond to pirates. In the good old days of DOS toys, game developers used very primitive copy protection methods. Let's say the requirement is to find a word in a manual on a specified page in a specified line. When CD-ROMs appeared, the game required the original disc in the drive to run, as well as the CD key being entered during installation. Both of these methods have long been unable to protect publishers and developers from piracy. Any algorithms can be hacked - it doesn’t matter whether it’s hardware disk protection or StarForce.
It's understandable that game developers and publishers want to protect their products, often with new, more intrusive security methods. Moreover, some methods turn out to be very dubious. Just one of these protections – mentioned several times above StarForce (www.star-force.ru), created Russian developers. By the way, StarForce is also the most common protection for licensed discs, used in Russia and the CIS countries.
Hacking StarForce is not necessary to harm your PC
This is what the StarForce driver looks like in the system.
What kind of protection is this? Is it possible and how difficult is it? StarForce hack? “Advanced encoding and activation technology for CD/CD-R/DVD and electronic software distribution,” is how the developers describe their system. But the way StarForce and some similar security systems carry out their tasks is one of the most intrusive and dubious. To run the game you need to install it on the system special StarForce driver, which is not deleted when the game is uninstalled and remains on the computer.
StarForce, together with other domestic companies, advocates for protection against piracy and destroys counterfeit products.
The StarForce driver very persistently tries to reinstall itself after manual removal or uninstall using a utility that can be found on the Internet.
New protection systems do more than just protect software from running pirated copies. They often proactively look for potentially dangerous programs (from an anti-piracy perspective) on the system and prevent them from running. Good examples can be considered programs like Nero, Alcohol 120% and Virtual DAEMON Version Manager below 4.00, although we also encountered other, more aggressive and severe symptoms of the behavior of such defenses. These range from disabling recording devices in Windows Media Player until access to the CD drive is prohibited both in software and in hardware. Sometimes the author pressed the drive button in vain to eject the tray: only restarting Windows helped.
Recall that the specific specifications of How work similar systems, are kept secret. For obvious reasons. But the results of the operation of such systems are not a secret to anyone and may be Very destructive. Some users even have to reinstall the system after failures of such protections.
In an interview with the Firing Squad website, the creators of the StarForce protection stubbornly did not acknowledge the fact that the driver causes problems, if not for everyone, then for some user systems. Keeping silent about the fact that even an unhacked StarForce can lead to problems is not the best policy for developers.
Here's what StarForce Technologies wrote to us: " To combat code reversal, we use a unique encryption system for executable application components. However, the greatest resonance is caused by the StarForce protection drivers, the presence of which makes it possible to reduce to almost zero the ability to freely emulate pirated images of licensed disks downloaded from the network, i.e. effectively resist home copying and replication of discs.". This is only part of the letter sent to our editor. The goal was to invite us to conduct an independent examination of the operation of the StarForce driver. If such an examination is done, we will publish additional material.
But today the results of an informal investigation available to us suggest that 30-40% of users had any(not necessarily fatal) problems associated with StarForce protection. On the other hand, we can responsibly state that no one The licensed disc from those protected by StarForce, received by our editorial staff from domestic publishers, has never caused any problems in our editorial configuration. Isn't it strange?
Questionable legal protection of StarForce
Another point is also important. The User License Agreement (EULA) covers the publishers and developers of the security system from any liability arising from damage caused by the security system. In other words, “we guarantee that problems will not arise, but if they do, please re-read the license agreement.”
Our international editorial staff consists of gaming journalists who often encounter defenses like StarForce and Macrovision. While writing game reviews, they had problems with protections here and there. When security system developers claim that no problems arise, they only have to agree with this, once again restoring the system.
Interestingly, similar protection systems are found in an increasing number of video games, but despite all the troubles for the end user, they do not really save the situation. We have seen many pirated copies of games where the protection is simply removed, and hacked exe files immediately appear on the Internet. It's funny what pirated versions They don’t have any protection, so playing them is much calmer and easier. And your computer will not suffer from the possible harmful effects that the protection driver may cause to the systems of legitimate users. Another not very pleasant feature of StarForce protection, essential for domestic gamers with their slow internet: patches that developers release after games are released, in most cases, should carry pieces of security code. Sometimes very “solid” - up to several tens of megabytes. This is where your money goes subscription fee for Internet traffic.
The day may well come when copy protection will cause enough damage to users' computers to attract the attention of the courts (they love this case in the US). And will the security developers be able to hide behind them? license agreement- a controversial issue. In the meantime, if your computer begins to behave differently after installing the game, look to see if a couple of hidden drivers have appeared on it. The same StarForce.
Hacking StarForce through the eyes of the press service
Recently, StarForce protection, which many experts assess as potentially dangerous, has attracted a lot of attention. The protection made headlines after the company threatened to sue journalists reporting on the protection's harmful effects on the system. In a letter to us, StarForce representatives write: "However, we are under great pressure from competitors and the pirate community, who are conducting large-scale PR campaigns online aimed at discrediting our defense and the entire company. We believe that the best solution At the moment there will be independent testing. I would like to note that it is the Western consumer who is target audience similar research."
Keygen for StarForce: according to the developer - a useless utility.
It is difficult for us to imagine PR campaigns sponsored by pirates and those who make money by hacking and deleting StarForce. But the developers are certainly right in believing that independent testing is the right solution. On the other hand, firstly, not a single “hardware” laboratory in the world, be it Tom’s Hardware Guide, iXBT or “Computer”, is able to provide full independent testing on thousands of different hardware and software configurations, and in -secondly, interesting statistics on StarForce have already been collected and continue to be collected. We invite those who use games protected by StarForce to leave their opinion in ours. Perhaps this will determine how your PCs will work in the future. After all, you shouldn’t have a separate computer for games?
The game "Blitzkrieg 2" is protected by StarForce.
Yes, StarForce is a very aggressive anti-piracy protection that installs a hidden driver (!) into the system in parallel with the installation of the game. This driver, according to information Boycott StarForce, "gives zero level privileges ( system level) any code running at the third level (user level).
Thus, with the help of the protection driver, any virus or Trojan can gain privileges operating system and take full control. Since the days of Windows NT/2000, operating systems of the Windows line have ensured high stability and security due to the separation of privileges, but with StarForce drivers, the old “holes” and instability of Windows 9x/Me systems return to normal, and any program (or virus) can reach to your system's kernel using StarForce drivers like a backdoor."
The methods used by the StarForce defense also lead to more direct and tangible problems for both gaming journalists and ordinary users who storm the forums technical support and completely sign up for the StarForce boycott campaign (this can be done). We wrote a little higher that our colleagues even encountered a situation where an unhacked StarForce blocked the optical drive tray and did not allow normal operation of the disk until a reboot.
Take a look at the technical support forums for games that use the StarForce protection system (by the way, you can see a list of them), and you will see almost countless threads started by users who had problems after installing a game with StarForce protection. Of course, there are also messages from those users who did not find any problems, so StarForce representatives honestly give examples of normally working systems.
Postal 2 is protected by StarForce.
What’s interesting is that in these discussions sometimes people appear who literally fanatically refute all the complaints and arguments of the affected users. But everything becomes clear if we remember that employees of the StarForce PR department were caught red-handed in composing such answers on behalf of mere mortals.
The culmination of the problems with StarForce has not yet arrived, but some publishers have already decided to abandon the use of the dubious system in their games, in response to protests from the gaming community. However, the problem of piracy, which led to the emergence of StarForce, remains. Yes, the need for efficient systems protection may lead publishers to resort to even more dubious methods, including hidden drivers and rootkits. Well, then viruses and Trojans are just a stone's throw away.
As long as there is piracy in the market, publishers have the right to protect their products. However, as we have already clearly seen with the Sony BMG scandal, this right should not override the consumer’s right to ensure that protection systems do not interfere with normal life and work.
Street Racing Syndicate is protected by StarForce.
The StarForce protection system has never been thoroughly tested in our laboratory, so we cannot reliably confirm whether the problems described are related to the installation of the protection. But if you collect all the facts and complaints related to games different developers and publishers, then the problems somehow coincide very well if the game uses StarForce protection.
Campaign website boycott StarForce is good place for more information about StarForce, as well as the progress of the campaign against this protection.
What games are protected by StarForce?
UFO: Aftershock is protected by StarForce.
Below is a list of games that are protected. Check if you are using such a game:
| Games under protection | |
| 7 Sins | StarForce protection |
| American Conquest: Divided Nation | StarForce protection |
| Anstoss 4 | StarForce protection |
| Bandits: Phoenix Rising | StarForce protection |
| Bet on Soldier | StarForce protection |
| Beyond Divinity | StarForce protection |
| Black Mirror | StarForce protection |
| Blitzkrieg 2 | StarForce protection |
| Blitzkrieg: Rolling Thunder | StarForce protection |
| Breed | StarForce protection |
| Brian Lara International Cricket 2005 | StarForce protection |
| Broken Sword 3: The Sleeping Dragon | StarForce protection |
| Brothers in Arms: Earned in Blood | StarForce protection |
| Castle Strike | StarForce protection |
| Chaos League | StarForce protection |
| Chaos League: Sudden Death | StarForce protection |
| Codename: Outbreak | StarForce protection |
| Codename: Panzers - Phase One | StarForce protection |
| Codename: Panzers - Phase Two | StarForce protection |
| Cold War | StarForce protection |
| Colin McRae Rally 2005 | StarForce protection |
| Cossacks II: Napoleonic Wars | StarForce protection |
| Cross Racing Championship 2005 | StarForce protection |
| Curse: The Eye of Isis | StarForce protection |
| Cycling Manager 3 | StarForce protection |
| Cycling Manager 4 | StarForce protection |
| D-Day | StarForce protection |
| Dead to Rights | StarForce protection |
| Demonic Speedway | StarForce protection |
| Desert Rats vs Afrika Korps | StarForce protection |
| Domination | StarForce protection |
| Emergency Fire Response | StarForce protection |
| Enigma: Rising Tide | StarForce protection |
| Etherlords II | StarForce protection |
| Fire Chief | StarForce protection |
| Fire Department | StarForce protection |
| Freedom Force vs The Third Reich | StarForce protection |
| Gangland | StarForce protection |
| Garfield | StarForce protection |
| Gooka: The Mystery of Janatris | StarForce protection |
| GT Legends | StarForce protection |
| GTR: FIA GT Racing Game | StarForce protection |
| Heroes of Might and Magic V | StarForce protection |
| Horse Race Manager | StarForce protection |
| Icewind Dale: Heart of Winter | StarForce protection |
| Keepsake | StarForce protection |
| Kicker Manager 2004 | StarForce protection |
| Kill Switch | StarForce protection |
| King Kong | StarForce protection |
| Knights of the Temple 2 | StarForce protection |
| Korea: Forgotten Conflict | StarForce protection |
| LMA Professional Manager 2005 | StarForce protection |
| Lock On: Flaming Cliffs | StarForce protection |
| Medieval Lords | StarForce protection |
| Namco Museum 50th Anniversary | StarForce protection |
| Neuro Hunter | StarForce protection |
| Nibiru | StarForce protection |
| Obscure | StarForce protection |
| Pac Man World 2 | StarForce protection |
| Pac Man World 3 | StarForce protection |
| Pariah | StarForce protection |
| Pax Romana | StarForce protection |
| Perimeter | StarForce protection |
| Perimeter: Emperor's Testament | StarForce protection |
| Pferdehof - Pferd und Pony | StarForce protection |
| Pop Star Academy | StarForce protection |
| Postal 2: Apocalypse Weekend | StarForce protection |
| Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones | StarForce protection |
| Pro Rugby Manager | StarForce protection |
| Psi-Ops | StarForce protection |
| Pure Pinball | StarForce protection |
| Rally Championship Xtreme | StarForce protection |
| Restaurant Empire | StarForce protection |
| Restricted Area | StarForce protection |
| Revolution | StarForce protection |
| Runaway: A Road Adventure | StarForce protection |
| Scrapland | StarForce protection |
| Second Sight | StarForce protection |
| Silent Hunter 3 | StarForce protection |
| Silent Storm | StarForce protection |
| Silkolene Honda Motocross GP | StarForce protection |
| Singles 2: Triple Trouble | StarForce protection |
| Singles: Flirt Up Your Life | StarForce protection |
| Sniper Elite | StarForce protection |
| Soldiers Heroes of World War 2 | StarForce protection |
| Sommerspiele 2004 | StarForce protection |
| Space Rangers 2 | StarForce protection |
| Splinter Cell 3: Chaos Theory | StarForce protection |
| Star Wolves | StarForce protection |
| Steel Savior | StarForce protection |
| Still Life | StarForce protection |
| Street Racing Syndicate | StarForce protection |
| Sudeki | StarForce protection |
| SuperPower 2 | StarForce protection |
| Syberia II | StarForce protection |
| The Fall: Last Days of Gaia | StarForce protection |
| The Moment of Silence | StarForce protection |
| The Suffering: Ties That Bind | StarForce protection |
| The Westerner | StarForce protection |
| TOCA 2 | StarForce protection |
| TrackMania | StarForce protection |
| TrackMania Nations | StarForce protection |
| TrackMania Sunrise | StarForce protection |
| Traitors Gate 2: Cypher | StarForce protection |
| UFO: Aftershock | StarForce protection |
| V8 Supercars 2 | StarForce protection |
| Virtual Skipper 3 | StarForce protection |
| Virtual Skipper 4 | StarForce protection |
| Vivisector | StarForce protection |
| Wildlife Park | StarForce protection |
| Wintersport Pro 2006 | StarForce protection |
| World Racing 2 | StarForce protection |
| World War II: Frontline Command | StarForce protection |
| Worms 4: Mayhem | StarForce protection |
| X3: Reunion | StarForce protection |
| XIII | StarForce protection |
| Xpand Rally | StarForce protection |
| Xuan-Yuan Sword 4 | StarForce protection |
Hacking StarForce is not the main danger
Anyone who proves that StarForce causes harm is promised $10,000.
Of course, there are problems associated with the use of StarForce - it’s stupid to hide it and it’s stupid to turn a blind eye to it. Of course, it’s unpleasant if a protection system is installed on your computer without your knowledge, or even asking, which, in theory, “allows you to practically reduce to zero the ability to freely emulate pirated images of licensed disks downloaded from the network,” but in practice interferes with the operation of the software software created far from the purposes that the developers incriminate it. And in relation to Russia, the problem is not at all the hacking of StarForce or potential hacking.
The fact is that there is another problem, even more important for our Russian-speaking readers than for visitors to the English-language international version of the site. The problem is that in Russia StarForce is almost the only protection that is provided for officially localized and domestic developments. Moreover, largely thanks to the power and accessibility of StarForce, the domestic gaming industry has the opportunity to develop more or less calmly, and domestic publishers have the opportunity to do business with foreign partners.
So, not everything in the StarForce case is so simple. Especially from the point of view of the Russian game industry and the Russian gamer...
What are we trying to achieve by talking about StarForce? Let's discuss! When talking about issues related to StarForce, we are in no way promoting piracy or unlicensed games. But we support the opinion of ordinary players who believe that publishers should directly indicate on the discs that the protection system carries the potential to harm the user’s computer. For example, on the box with Quake 4 it is written: "NOTICE: This game contains technology intended to prevent copying that may conflict with some disk and virtual drives." which translates to "Warning: This game contains copy protection technology that may conflict with some discs and virtual drives."
This requirement in the Russian Federation can only be legalized through the law on “Protection of Consumer Rights”. Namely:
Article 7. Consumer’s right to safety of goods (work, services)
1. The consumer has the right to ensure that the product (work, service), under normal conditions of its use, storage, transportation and disposal, is safe for the life and health of the consumer, environment, and also did not cause damage to the consumer’s property. Requirements that must ensure the safety of goods (work, services) for the life and health of the consumer, the environment, as well as the prevention of harm to the consumer’s property, are mandatory and are established by law or in the manner established by it.
2. The manufacturer (performer) is obliged to ensure the safety of the product (work) during the established service life or shelf life of the product (work). If, in accordance with paragraph 1 of Article 5 of this Law, the manufacturer (performer) has not established a service life for the product (work), he is obliged to ensure the safety of the product (work) for ten years from the date of transfer of the product (work) to the consumer.
Damage caused to the life, health or property of a consumer due to failure to ensure the safety of goods (work) is subject to compensation in accordance with Article 14 of this Law.
And most importantly:
3. If for safe use a product (work, service), its storage, transportation and disposal must comply with special rules (hereinafter referred to as the rules), the manufacturer (performer) is obliged to indicate these rules in the accompanying documentation for the product (work, service), on a label, marking or in another way, and the seller (performer) is obliged to bring these rules to the attention of the consumer.
StarForce are drivers for the corresponding protection system for the Windows 7 operating system. They are also suitable for ensuring correct operation with DRM on later OSes (Windows 10 and 8).
First of all, the driver is necessary in order to be able to play old games that have protection against unauthorized copying, as well as use some, also quite old, versions of programs (mainly from developers from Russia and the CIS countries).
About DRM
The StarForce protection system is well known to all “old school” gamers. At one time, this DRM greatly frayed the nerves of game lovers. Before the spread of broadband Internet and the development of digital distribution services like and, it was customary to buy games on physical media(CD and DVD discs). In order to protect licensed copies from illegal distribution, developers most often “turned” to StarForce. The drivers for this DRM were installed on the system along with the game distribution.
Unfortunately, in addition to providing protection, StarForce also brought headaches to responsible buyers of licensed products. For example, it periodically refused to “recognize” media in drives or did not do it the first time. In addition, older versions of SF drivers refused to work with new versions of the Windows operating system. So even if there was a licensed disc, it was not possible to gain access to the game. As a result, the developer had to release a special “patch”. This is exactly what you can download from our website to play old projects on the “seven”.
Important information
Please note that after installing the patch, you will definitely need to restart your computer, as well as the fact that if you do not have a disk drive, even installing one will not help you run the game (you will have to use images or “cracks”).
Key Features
- provides correct operation StarForce drivers for Windows 7;
- also works with “later” versions of the OS;
- installed automatically;
- works with any version of the original software;
- is the official solution from the DRM developer company.
Lately everything
more and more programs being released on
released on discs on the Russian market,
protected by the StarForce system – that’s almost everything
games produced by 1 C, Pyccobit, etc.
A natural question arises - how
copy disks protected by StarForce? After all
discs have their own expiration date, and having purchased
licensed disc in a few months
intensive use may
turn out that the disk has become non-working... For
For this purpose, you can always create an archive
a copy of the disk, unless of course
prohibited by the license agreement.
A little theory
As they say, knowledge
knowledge replaces several principles
many facts. We will also adhere to
this postulate.
Protection determines
original disc by reading time different
disk areas. On the disk, as you know, there is
a spiral path along which
the laser beam is oriented when reading and
records. When producing StarForce disks, this
the track itself is not standard
configuration will thus change
data density in different sectors and
therefore, the time for reading them will also be
miscellaneous. On all CD-Rs and CD-RW discs this
the guide track is applied when
production, and not when recording a disc.
Therefore, all such media
are definitely rejected by StarForce.
Burn a disc protected by StarForce, which
would work like the original because of this
it is forbidden!.
But there are programs
allowing you to create a disk image - regular
file or several, including
information about the physical structure of the disk (about
sector density) and allowing
further emulate read delays.
A little about the software
To create images you can
use:
- BlindWrite Suite (www.blindwrite.com)
- a program for creating disk images and
their subsequent recording; - Alcohol 120% (http://www.alcohol-soft.com) - allows
create images and burn them to disks,
and can also create up to 31
"virtual" CD-ROMs into which you can
mount disk image files and
work with them as with conventional drives. - DAEMON Tools program
(www.daemon-tools.net)
is intended only for creating
virtual disk and emulation, with its
you cannot create a disk image using
burn it to CD. - Of course, other programs that
quite a lot and you can’t find them
constitutes labor. At the moment not in
all have an emulation function implemented
physical structure of the disk, but I think
after a while something like this
will be implemented in most
common CD/DVD emulator programs
, CD-ROM XA , CD-Extra , CD-i Bridge, CD-i
- File systems
- StarForce
Protection options
FrontLine Disc
CD/DVD protection system. There are three subtypes of protection: FL Disc CD/DVD, FL Disc CD-R/DVD-R, FL Disc CD Keyless/DVD Keyless.
- FL Disc CD/DVD. Used to protect applications distributed on an industrial scale.
- FL Disc CD Keyless/DVD Keyless. The protection is similar to FL Disc CD/DVD, but the process of creating a master disc is different. When checking a disk, a key is not required.
- FL Disc CD-R/DVD-R. Used to protect applications distributed on CD-R/DVD-R discs. When verifying the authenticity of a disk, a key is not required.
In addition, there is a division according to the level of protection:
- Disc Basic Simplified version. Mainly used for protection against home copying. Low burglary resistance. Emulator protection is not used.
- Disc Pro Compared to Basic more high protection program code against hacking, protection against emulators.
- Disc Elite Almost similar to Disc Pro, but uses more advanced algorithms. Guaranteed burglary resistance certain period time.
To check a disk, the number of sectors on certain rings of the disk spiral is determined, followed by comparison of the obtained data with the information encoded in the key. When copying the original disc to a CD-R/DVD-R, these data are guaranteed not to match, and the verification procedure will fail. StarForce also uses protection against emulators, for which it installs its own driver into the operating system to distinguish between real optical drives from virtual ones created by programs such as DAEMON Tools.
FrontLine ProActive
A system for protecting programs distributed via the Internet through digital distribution. In fact, FL ProActive is a Digital Rights Management (DRM) system. The system offers different models distribution of digital software - buy only, try&buy (trial), demo, rent, subscription. A program protected by FL ProActive may be freely available, but with using SDK A StarForce developer can protect both individual program functions and the entire program. To activate it you will need to enter special key, issued by the developer, taking into account the hardware characteristics of the user’s computer. Activation is possible both via the Internet and via SMS or phone call. Recently, this solution is increasingly being used to protect business applications.
FrontLine Universal
Combines the capabilities of FL Disc, FL ProActive. Programs protected by FrontLine Universal are distributed on CD/DVD discs. The user can use protection by constantly inserting the disc, as is the case with FL Disc, or activate the purchased product via the Internet. In the case of online registration, a disk is no longer required to run the application. Used to avoid transfer/resale limited quantity activations (specific conditions are determined by the publisher).
StarForce Crypto
Protects only the application code without being tied to the media or computer. Serves to counteract analysis source code applications. Used by companies that want to hide the algorithms of their programs from prying eyes.
Technology "Backup"
At the request of the customer, it can be used in FrontLine Disc products. It is a technology that allows the use of licensed software distributed on optical media, without checking the disk. The technology was used in the games “Ka-50: Black Shark” and Avencast: Rise of the Mage released in 2008, and received a lot positive feedback from users.
An independent organization of players tested StarForce FrontLine ProActive
On February 8, 2010, the world saw the light of a report by an independent organization of gamers - Reclaim Your Game (RYG), dedicated to one of the company's products most frequently used by publishers recently - FrontLine ProActive. The RYG website contains a full report on the two games we tested.
StarForce reputation
StarForce has earned a bad reputation in user circles. In addition to the exceptional strength of the protection (and therefore the late release of illegal versions; the record is Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory, which lasted 422 days), the reasons for this are as follows:
Driver
In versions 3.x, StarForce installed its own CD drive driver designed to protect against emulators. This driver was installed secretly and was not removed after uninstalling the game. In addition, in 2006, two problems were discovered: firstly, compatibility with some CD drives turned out to be incomplete (system crashes were observed that stopped when the driver was uninstalled; there were even rumors about drive failures). Secondly, it turned out that the driver contains gross mistake, allowing you to perform any program code With full rights, thus presenting a gap in the computer's security. In addition, some free games that run without a disc (for example, Trackmania Nations) also install StarForce drivers - either to protect against cheating, or to make it more difficult to hack paid version"Similarly".
| The developers describe themselves as people with a hacker background, strong in systems programming. The guys really know the operating system's secret places like their own backyard. But they hardly know how to program, because programming is, first of all, design and taking risks into account. A program aimed at mass use simply cannot use undocumented features and other non-traditional programming techniques. |
Six months later, Protection Technology fixed the error with exceeding rights. Due to frequent rumors about drive failures, the company announced a promotion, according to which $1000 was awarded to anyone who could prove that StarForce was harmful to a computer. Later, the amount was increased to $3,000, and then to $5,000, but the harm caused by StarForce’s decisions was never proven.
However, in response, the developers had to make a request when installing drivers, an uninstaller utility, and “driverless” versions of protection. Starting from version 4.x, uninstallation is automatically triggered when the last protected game is deleted. In the same versions 4.x, the company stopped the practice of using its own device drivers and began to work through standard drivers Windows. The protection driver remains, but it performs synchronization roles and does not work directly with the equipment.
64-bit machines
StarForce, among other things, uses a method of analyzing the physical location of data to verify the authenticity of a disk. As a result, even due to minor damage to the disc, which has little effect on its readability and the ability to install a game or program from it, the StarForce system may recognize the disc as non-genuine. Thus, users who paid a substantial amount for a licensed product often lost it due to small scratches on the surface of the disk, and in the case of licensed optical disks, this sometimes occurred due to natural wear and tear on the media.
Hack StarForce
The basis of protection is the so-called virtual machine. This is a special subroutine that can change its position in memory, encrypt and decrypt sections of code, and swap data and addresses. Even an experienced reverse programmer will take a lot of time to disassemble a virtual machine. Therefore, the following algorithm is usually used to hack Starforce.
1. A dump of the program itself is made when it is launched in memory using a license disk.
2. A dump of the virtual machine is made (the code sections responsible for decrypting the original program are saved from memory to disk). The point of this method is that after loading memory sections from disk, all addresses remain the same as they would be if a licensed disk was used.
3. Import of functions is restored (for Starforce versions 4.xx).
4. The anti-dump protection is removed, which prevents the resulting file from running on a computer other than the attacker’s computer (binding by CPUID is used).
Moreover, to remove the youngest Starforce versions Basic, you only need to complete steps 1 and 3. Virtual machine used in the more advanced version of Starforce Pro/Builder.