He downloaded the crack, disabled his antivirus as the instructions said, and installed the software. For a month, it worked beautifully. He designed two small systems, saved time, and felt clever.

Marco was a budding solar installer. He had just started his small business designing residential PV systems. But the full license for PV*SOL — a leading simulation tool — cost €1,000. Too steep, he thought, especially when a cracked version was just a few clicks away on a shady forum.

Then the problems began.