Don’t pirate the newest Star Wars film, unless you like malware

Patience is a virtue. And when it comes to watching Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, it also just might save your computer from some nasty malware.

As excited fans champed at the bit ahead of the Dec. 19 release of the latest Star Wars film, some overeager lovers of the space opera took a slightly different approach and attempted to illegally pirate the damn thing. As cybersecurity firm Kaspersky Lab reports, that's led to some rather unfortunate outcomes.

Specifically, the company notes 285,103 Star Wars-themed "malware attacks" occurred this year alone, with 37,772 users targeted. And The Rise of Skywalker hasn't escaped unscathed, with at least 83 users falling prey to 65 malware files made to look like the movie.

We've known for a long time that hackers and various digital bad actors love to take advantage of popular entertainment franchises to spread viruses. When Game of Thrones was at its cultural zenith, pirated copies of the show, available for download on torrent sites like The Pirate Bay, often contained various forms of hidden malware.

It seems a good hacking ploy never goes out of style.

Original image has been replaced. Credit: Mashable

But why go to all the trouble of secretly installing a credit card-stealing program on someone's computer when you can just straight up ask them for it?

"Kaspersky researchers found over 30 fraudulent websites and social media profiles disguised as official movie accounts (the actual number of these sites may be much higher) that supposedly distribute free copies of the latest film in the franchise," notes the report. "These websites collect unwary users’ credit card data, under the pretense of necessary registration on the portal."

Which, yeah, maybe don't enter your credit card into shady websites offering early access to major Disney films? There's already Disney+ for that.

In the end, your best bet at seeing The Rise of Skywalker in the near future is to take the tried-and-true approach: Purchase a movie ticket. Barring that? Well, may the Force be with you.