Your friends can purchase black-market software if they like, but if they need support or updates from the company, they'll simply be SOL (out of luck). And, almost always, items advertised as OEM software are a scam. Selling cracked software is also illegal. The short-and-sweet answer is that keygens are illegal if they are used to crack or unlock legitimate software. So my question is, aside from viruses or such, can programs like keygen and such be harmful to your computer? ' However, my friends want to purchase keygens and cracked software so they do not pay full retail. I always purchase new software and from the company itself - example: Adobe, Corel, etc. Some use 'kegen' programs to generate software keys in order to unlock software. I love your articles! I was just wondering: many sites out there, including eBay members are selling copies or 'cracked' software.