software
Is it legal to publish APK source code?
<p>There is an Android backgammon program (several million downloads, most of them free and sponsored by ads, the rest of them paid for) that I have long suspected is cheating.</p>
<p>I have finally, after a lot of hard work and my own programming skills, managed to reverse engineer the APK (even though the developer has tried to conceal his dodgy dealing behind ProGuard).</p>
<p>Is it illegal for me to publish the bits of code that do the cheating?</p>
<p>I'm mindful of the whole &quot;intellectual property&quot; thing......but if something is dodgy, it needs exposing surely?</p>

<p>You could experimentally test the legality of this action. The law does not generally condone vigilante action, and copying and distributing program source code is, on the face of it, illegal copyright infringement. However, in the US you can try the &quot;fair use&quot; defense. That means you would have to go to court, but your lawyer would advance an argument that this is allowed copying. The main argument would be based on &quot;limited extent of copying&quot; (if you only publish a fraction of the code), and the &quot;comment&quot; purpose (essentially, expression a political position by showing &quot;This is what he did&quot;).</p>
