Empress (cracker)

Empress (sometimes stylized EMPRESS) is a video game cracker who specializes in breaking anti-piracy software. She has also released cracked games under the moniker C000005.[1]

Empress is known as one of the few crackers who can bypass Denuvo. Her motivation is to remove the software license aspect of digital games in an effort to preserve them after developers drop support.[2] She also claims that removing digital rights management (DRM) decreases performance issues in a game.[3]

Career

Empress became interested in the DRM-cracking scene in 2014.[2] Her followers can select which game they want cracked by participating in the polls she posts. Her work is funded by crowdsourced donations.[2] She uses the money to pay her living costs, upgrade hardware, and purchase games that she intends to crack. She acknowledges that accepting payment for piracy is against the etiquette of the warez scene.[1]

Empress rose to prominence in 2019 after releasing a cracked version of Red Dead Redemption 2.[4] She has cracked other high-profile games such as Mortal Kombat 11 and Anno 1800.[2] In February 2021, Empress stated that she was arrested while working on the crack for Immortals Fenyx Rising. She blamed the repacker FitGirl, with whom she had a feud.[5] However, that March, Empress was available to publish a workaround for the online check-in system of Battle.net.[6]

In 2023, Empress was banned from Reddit. She released a cracked version of Hogwarts Legacy that February.[7]

References
  1. Maxwell, Andy (26 September 2020). "Games Cracker 'EMPRESS' Wants to Crowdfund Denuvo Cracks". TorrentFreak. Retrieved 5 March 2023.
  2. D'Anastasio, Cecilia (22 February 2021). "The Woman Bulldozing Video Games' Toughest DRM". Wired. Retrieved 5 March 2023.
  3. Macgregor, Jody (12 July 2021). "Pirates claim Resident Evil 8 crack fixes performance problems". PC Gamer. Retrieved 5 March 2023.
  4. Besharaty, Mark B. (21 February 2023). "Hacker Empress Set to Release Highly Anticipated Hogwarts Legacy Empress Crack". Gamelevate. Retrieved 5 March 2023.
  5. Maxwell, Andy (24 February 2021). "Denuvo Cracker EMPRESS "Arrested", Blames Repacker FitGirl & Reddit For Witch-Hunt". TorrentFreak. Retrieved 5 March 2023.
  6. Machkovech, Sam (28 March 2021). "Activision releases online-only PC game without online content, cracked in one day". Ars Technica. Retrieved 5 March 2023.
  7. Maruccia, Alfonso (24 February 2023). "Notorious game cracker has removed Denuvo from Hogwarts Legacy after just two weeks". TechSpot. Retrieved 5 March 2023.
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