Etymology The leetspeak form of wares, as a contraction of software.
1
Internet, Leet, Dated, Usually Software that is illegally obtained or distributed.
By the end of the day Mad Hatter, a ringleader of the software piracy group called the Inner Circle, will have poured 300 Mbytes of illegal “warez” onto the Internet.1997 April 1, David McCandless, “Warez Wars”, in Wired, →ISSN:
Too many gamers see nothing wrong with downloading “warez” (usually pronounced “wares,” but also “wah-rez”), retail software products that have been “ripped” to make them smaller and remove copy protection.1999 April, T. Liam McDonald, “WaReZ the Logic?”, in Maximum PC, →ISSN, page 41:
1 more example
Warez appeared in the 1980s with the advent of Bulletin Board Systems.2012, Eric Diehl, Securing Digital Video […] , Springer Science & Business Media, →ISBN, page 16:
warez
verb
Etymology The leetspeak form of wares, as a contraction of software.
1
Internet, Leet, Dated To obtain a copy of (software or other works of authorship) illegally.
Many of these keys are, obviously, being used by people who've warezed XP, but there's also a reasonably large number of software professionals and refuseniks who have used them even though they have a legitimately bought version of XP.2002 June 7, John Lettice, “MS turns up heat on warezed WinXP copies”, in The Register:
Warezed SoundForge Files In Windows Media Player [title]2004 November 12, Timothy Lord, “Warezed SoundForge Files In Windows Media Player”, in Slashdot: