If you download a paid asset for free, how can they find out about it?

Question

Unity

Hello, recently the question of how you can find out that someone is using someone else's asset illegally has become interesting, for example, this is the mechanics of saving progress or the mechanics of the notification system in the game, they are essentially invisible, they exist purely within the project, in general, something like this discover?

Answer 1

In theory, someone can decompile the project and it will already become clear there.
But how realistic and possible it is - not to say, but decompilation definitely takes place

Answer 2

a code can be written to the asset, which reports who uses it to the server

Answer 3

From lighter ones that do not require special knowledge or skills to more complex:
* textures
* animations
* models, terrain
* graphical interfaces, dialog boxes
* sounds, music
* in-game processes, mechanics
* particles
* shaders
* left unused resources
* project structure and resource naming
* identity of the code or its structure/logic when obfuscated
In any case, there should always be an interested person who a) finds something to cling to, b) is not too lazy to do something with this information. If we are talking about a free project, then no one cares. If about paid, then the question is how much your product competes with it and how much the original worries about copyright (hello Nintendo).