Pirates vet things. Take a look at rentry.org/pgames for an example of a list of pirate sites that is meticulously vetted and updated. As long as pirates stick to those, they generally don’t have to worry about malware.
Sure, it’s possible for someone to get caught out by one of these sites deciding to turn bad, but that’s only going to work for like a day. It’s like kicking a hornet’s nest in the pirating world.
YellowParenti@lemmy.wtf 1 week ago
Im sure whoever injects malware would be harassed and threatened to be doxxed. it’s a point of pride and the release groups very small. Ironically, the “risky” cracked version actually looks and runs better than the version you buy legitimately.