Hack Software and Run the Trial Program Forever

In this post, I will show you how to hack a Software and run the trial program forever. Most of us are familiar with many software programs that run only for a specified period of time in the trial mode. Once the trial period is expired, these programs stop functioning and demand for a purchase.

However, there is a way to run the software programs so that they function beyond the trial period. Isn’t this interesting?

Well, before I tell you how to hack the software and make it run in the trial mode forever, we will have to first understand how the licensing scheme of these programs work. I’ll try to explain this in brief.

When the software programs are installed for the first time, they make an entry into the Windows Registry with the details such as Installed Date and Time, installed path etc. After the installation, every time you run the program, it compares the current system date and time with the installed date and time. With this, it can make out whether the trial period is expired or not.

So, with this being the case, just manually changing the system date to an earlier date will not solve the problem. For this purpose there is a small tool known as RunAsDate.

RunAsDate is a small utility that allows you to run a program in the date and time that you specify. This utility doesn’t change the current system date, but it only injects the date/time that you specify into the desired application.

RunAsDate intercepts the kernel API calls that returns the current date and time (GetSystemTime, GetLocalTime, GetSystemTimeAsFileTime), and replaces the current date/time with the date/time that you specify. It works with Windows 2000, XP, 2003, Vista and 7.

You can download RunAsDate from the following link:

Download RunAsDate

Steps to Hack the Software and Run the Trial Program Forever:

You will have to follow these tips carefully to successfully hack a software and make it run in the trial mode forever:

1. Note down the date and time, when you install the software for the first time.
2. Once the trial period expires, you must always run the software using RunAsDate.
3. After the trial period is expired, do not run the software(program) directly. If you run the software directly even once, this hack may no longer work.
4. It is better and safe to inject the date of the last day in the trial period.

For example, if the trial period expires on jan 30 2009, always inject the date as jan 29 2009 in the RunAsDate. I hope this helps! Please express your experience and opinions through comments.