I said “essentially” nonexistent. Windows users like to repeat ad nauseum the “less common platform” argument, but most simply don’t understand that the way Mac OS X functions is fundamentally different from the way Windows functions. And Macs are far more common than Linux machines, yet there are more Linux viruses than Mac viruses.
Well, the first link to to the blog of a ranting Mac-hater and links to the relevant Intego announcement from the middle of April, which announcement specifically says, “While Intego has not found any instances of Macs being infected by this in the wild…” Being this was almost 6 months ago, that particular vulnerability has undoubtedly been patched by now. Another link quotes a university IT specialist, who erroneously states that Mac OS X is based on Linux, while also quoting that same university’s resident Mac expert who says she installs antivirus software purely because it’s policy, not because she thinks Macs are especially vulnerable. Another of those links lists several viruses that existed in the “old” Mac OS, which was an entirely different OS from OS X, and one pretty harmless OS X virus from 2006.
Anyway, I’ve run spyware/keylogger scans and also downloaded and run antivirus software, and my machine came up clean, as expected.
Further investigation leads me to suspect a Wowhead Looter/Client security problem. It occurred to me that I never type any of my toons’ names in conjunction with my password, so how would a keylogger (if I had one) even connect the two? And there’s also the fact that this e-mail was sent to the wrong e-mail address - my primary e-mall address (which is the one registered with Wowhead) rather than the unique address I use as my Battle.net/game login. That Wowhead Looter/Client, though … it tracks everything my characters loot, and also tracks their tradeskills, pets, mounts, gear, etc, and uploads that as well to my character profiles on the Wowhead site. So since I was using the same password for Wowhead that I used for the game itself, the Wowhead client was sending that password to log into Wowhead, and then, I assume, transmitting my character names for the purpose of updating my profiles. While the Windows version of the Wowhead Client was created by the paid Wowhead programmers, the Mac version was coded by a “volunteer” (I was told this when I submitted a bug report a while back) and thus may not have been subjected to the same level of testing as the Windows client. It’s possible, then, that the Mac Wowhead Client is not adequately encrypting the information it transmits, leaving open the chance that that information might be intercepted. I’ve reported these concerns to Wowhead, so we’ll see where that goes.
On my mage, I deliberately avoided talking to that initial questgiver in Dalaran so that the LFG tool wouldn’t randomly dump me into the ICC 5-mans, as I’d been led to believe I couldn’t do the heroic versions until I’d done the normal versions. That turned out to be incorrect. When my mage’s gear eventually got good enough (through drops from other heroics + Triumph gear), she started getting dumped into heroic FoS and then H:PoS, still without having ever done the “normal” versions. She’s never been randomed into H:HoR, though - I think you do have to talk to Jaina for that. Except for her staff, bracers, boots, and one trinket, all of her gear is iLvl 232 minimum, including a few 245s, the 264 Frost badge cloak, and the T10 iLvl 251 shoulders.
My Coren Direbrew runs are turning into a repeat of my Frost Lord Ahune runs - both of my lvl 80 paladins have now received … the dagger (they also both got the staff off Ahune). My mage did get the Mithril Pocketwatch, so I guess that’s something. Keliraeda, my belf pally, got her Frost total high enough to buy the iLvl 264 cloak (Might of the Ocean Serpent, or whatever it’s called), which was a major upgrade from the iLvl 187 cloak she’d been wearing. And Eilyssana, my lvl 80 human pally, doesn’t need to do anything but Direbrew runs for the mount now. She earned Brewmaster last year, and has all the achievements. She got both of the pets last year as well, so all she had left to purchase with tokens this year was the Brewfest Pony Keg and the B.E.E.R. Goggles, and she’s done that. No more ram racing for her!
And speaking of ram racing, is it just me or is the Horde version completely borked compared to the Alliance version? When I do it on my Alliance toons, I can consistently complete 14 circuits for 28 tokens every time, without my ram ever getting “exhausted” or getting hung up on an apple barrel or other obstacle, and never needing to slow down. I can make my turns several yards from the keg tosser and keg catcher and they’ll detect my presence and toss or catch my keg as appropriate. The barrels are placed where you can easily leap over them. Meanwhile on the Horde side, the NPCs don’t seem to notice me unless I ride right over top of them; the apple barrels don’t trigger unless I run my ram right into them, the apple barrels are positioned where it’s impossible to jump over them, and the first barrel after the keg-catching NPC is exactly far enough away for my ram to hit 100 and become exhausted a split second before I hit it. I can’t believe the problem is lag - Lightbringer and Cairne are hosted in the same server farm, and Cairne’s Horde population is far lower than Lightbringer’s Alliance population, so there are fewer Hordies doing the ram racing at any given time. Yet my Horde toons on Cairne are lucky to complete 8 circuits.