Encrypted code is usually done with the
Zend Encoder.
According to the product page,
"the code is both obfuscated and encoded, making it virtually impossible to reverse engineer."
Personally I think the idea of encrypting PHP code for such things as vBulletin hacks, or any PHP script/snippet that is free is quite pointless. I can see a product costing a good deal of money to maybe being PHP encrypted, but only if the product is not expected to be configured and tweaked by customers--otherwise, if it was something like vBulletin and was encrypted, who the hell would buy it? (well, not those wishing to put their own innovation into their forum).