[andreyf]

Bots don't require computer vision or any kind of sensory input; they can extract the native data they need straight out of the application's memory space.

I'm pretty sure WoW keeps track of all applications running on your computer. I think the way people do it is by using a hub and packet sniffers on a separate computer, although I imagine WoW traffic could easily be encrypted... so shrug.

[randallsquared]

All this hypothetical talk is very nice, but there actually is a wowbot that Blizzard has been unable to effectively use countermeasures against, called MMOGlider. They've decided to simply sue after repeated failure to solve it technically.

[eru]

Or you just use a virtual machine - of which WoW is unaware.

A bit like the matrix.