So long as you have a tough combat ship they're really more nuisance than actual threat, but a very big nuisance they are indeed. Unless you actually have business in that system you can usually just ignore them.
Recommendation: Research laser towers as high as you can get. Build as many as you can on each planet you can, even colonizing just to make bases if you must... TL32 bases will tear pirates apart like nothing. Build stations with weapon bays too. They will shoot at pirates despite not having an officer, so building one around each planet will give you further defense. These should be sufficient to annihilate any pirates that appear in your own systems.
That's all great advice for established empires with TL32 tech, but the real problem is that it takes months (usually) to reach that level without assistance, and in the mean time, your new empire is getting annihilated by the TL32 pirates who spawned when one of the big empires flew through to take a look at you.
To be fair, a lot of that problem arises from the tech system being unbalanced (there is no way to even scratch a ship more than 5 TL above you in ship-to-ship combat, even with superior numbers), but it's suppressed new empires heavily, especially those who can't get on every day to fight pirates.
KG
