Protect your EA (Trial Period)

If you want to give the user of the program a try-before-buy program you can limit the usage of your program by limited period of time and after this period the program will not work.
Use the code below to limit your program for period of time.
int start()
{
string expire_date = "2006.31.06"; //<-- hard coded datetime
datetime e_d = StrToTime(expire_date);

if (CurTime() >= e_d)
{
Alert ("The trial version has been expired!");
return(0);
}
// your normal code!
return(0);
}

Dude, this would take a computer savvy guy no more than 10 minutes to crack such a protection.

dollarfinder said:

If you want to give the user of the program a try-before-buy program you can limit the usage of your program by limited period of time and after this period the program will not work.
Use the code below to limit your program for period of time.
int start()
{
string expire_date = "2006.31.06"; //<-- hard coded datetime
datetime e_d = StrToTime(expire_date);

if (CurTime() >= e_d)
{
Alert ("The trial version has been expired!");
return(0);
}
// your normal code!
return(0);
}

Click to expand...

Really? Tell me how

Easy, you disassemble the code (with ready made available tools such as W32DASM) and look for references to the string : "The trial version has been expired!", then you are in the code, you replace the conditional jump by a normal jump, it takes one byte, and then you are off using the software forever.
There is much more to protecting a software than just the basic :
if (bad guy)
goto not_using_the_software
else
goto using_the_software

dollarfinder said:

Really? Tell me how

Click to expand...

dollarfinder said:

Really? Tell me how

Click to expand...

Any half decent programmer would get around this ridiculous solution in an instant. Those without the technical knowledge would simply pay $10 to one of the dozens of companies set up to decompile EA's or indicators, the guys offering these services will even remove simple restriction attempts such as you are suggesting free of charge

There's sites where you can download partially functioning decompilers that will decompile part of your exe just to prove they work, and these can be purchased for next to nothing

Protecting a Metatrader EA or indicator is a much more complex business

The best way to protect an EA is by incorporating part of the trade logics in an encrypted DLL. DLLs are much tougher to decompile and also costlier to decompile. Most of the EA decompilers out there simply use decompiling software or get someone with one to do for them. DLL decompiling is costly, and most hackers are well versed in mql4 only.

RapidForex's Ironclad is one of the example, the EAs using their encrypted DLLs are much tougher to crack as part of the source is actually in the DLL.

jordank said:

The best way to protect an EA is by incorporating part of the trade logics in an encrypted DLL. DLLs are much tougher to decompile and also costlier to decompile. Most of the EA decompilers out there simply use decompiling software or get someone with one to do for them. DLL decompiling is costly, and most hackers are well versed in mql4 only.

RapidForex's Ironclad is one of the example, the EAs using their encrypted DLLs are much tougher to crack as part of the source is actually in the DLL.

Click to expand...

Please, can you tell me who is RapidForex´s Ironclad or the website?.
My email tronss gmail com
Thanks