WoW Forever: “IRS” Addon Tries to Flag Suspicious Gold

The World of Warcraft: Forever community has responded to Blizzard’s tougher stance on real-money gold buying with a very unusual tool. One player created an addon called “IRS – Illicit Riches Scanner,” which analyzes character statistics and tries to flag gold balances that do not appear to match a player’s visible in-game activity.

The addon surfaced only days after controversy involving streamer Ziqo, who accepted large amounts of gold from two low-level characters during the WoW Forever beta. Blizzard later removed the gold from his mage but did not suspend his account.

The tool is designed to provide a rough estimate of whether a character’s wealth appears consistent with the gold they have earned through normal gameplay.

“IRS” Compares Gold With Character Statistics

Illicit Riches Scanner does not function like a traditional anti-cheat system.

It does not inspect network traffic or private transaction logs. Instead, it pulls from statistics World of Warcraft already tracks for individual characters.

Those can include:

• highest amount of gold ever held
• gold looted from enemies
• quest rewards
• vendor sales
• auction house activity
• completed quests
• enemies killed
• profession progress

The addon then compares a character’s known wealth against the income sources it can identify.

If a large portion of that gold cannot be accounted for, the character may be flagged as suspicious.

Ziqo Tests the Addon Live on Stream

The addon was not initially released publicly.

A viewer sent Ziqo an early beta build after Blizzard removed his gold.

The streamer then tested it live on several nearby characters.

One level 12 mage, for example, appeared to have a completely explainable gold balance based on recorded activity.

Another character showed thousands of auction house transactions and appeared to be a typical bank or auction alt.

Some characters, however, did not have enough recorded history for the addon to make a useful judgment.

Ziqo’s Own Character Fails the Audit

The most ironic moment came when Ziqo scanned his own character.

The addon flagged most of his peak gold balance as unexplained.

Out of more than 500 gold, only a small portion could be matched to the character statistics the tool was able to read.

Ziqo joked that he was failing the audit.

That result also highlighted one of the biggest limitations of the addon.

The Addon Is Still Highly Inaccurate

IRS is nowhere close to being reliable proof of gold buying.

Ziqo himself described the beta as very buggy, while other players pointed out that WoW’s own tracked statistics do not always capture every source of income correctly.

Potential problem areas include:

• incomplete auction house sales data
• certain quest rewards
• direct player-to-player trades
• gold received from guild members or friends
• older character history
• transfers between characters on the same account

That means the addon can flag a player even when all of their gold was earned legitimately.

At best, the tool provides a warning sign.

It does not prove that someone bought gold with real money.

Blizzard Recently Promised Tougher Punishments

The addon appeared against the backdrop of Blizzard’s renewed crackdown on real-money trading and gold buying.

Senior Game Designer Josh Greenfield recently said Blizzard plans to punish gold buyers much more aggressively.

The focus is not only on sellers, bots, or organized RMT networks.

Players who knowingly buy gold, or who accept obviously suspicious amounts of illegitimate gold, can also face account action.

Depending on the case, penalties could include gold removal, temporary suspensions, or permanent bans.

Ziqo Received Hundreds of Gold From Level 1 Characters

The controversy escalated after Ziqo accepted two unusually large trades during a stream.

Two level 1 characters reportedly handed him 380 gold and 175 gold.

In a beta that had only been live for a short period, those amounts immediately raised eyebrows.

Ziqo himself questioned whether that much gold could realistically have been earned through normal gameplay.

He still accepted the trades.

Blizzard later stepped in and reduced the gold on his mage to only a small amount of silver.

Players Still Debate Whether the Punishment Was Enough

Blizzard’s response sparked a wider debate.

Some players argued that Ziqo should have received a much harsher penalty, pointing to Blizzard’s earlier warnings about knowingly accepting illicit gold.

Others felt that removing the gold was sufficient because the actual source of the money had not been conclusively proven in public.

Community Manager Kaivax later clarified that recipients can face penalties if they knew or reasonably should have known that the gold was illegitimate.

That makes accepting suspicious gold donations increasingly risky, even when the recipient did not purchase the gold directly.

WoW Forever Now Has Its Own “Tax Agency”

The addon’s name is intentionally tongue-in-cheek.

In the United States, IRS is short for the Internal Revenue Service, the federal tax agency.

“Illicit Riches Scanner” plays directly on that idea.

In practice, the addon acts like an unofficial audit system for Azeroth.

For streamers or guild leaders who regularly receive large amounts of gold from strangers, it could at least offer a quick way to see whether a character’s visible activity appears consistent with their wealth.

That does not make it definitive.

A clean result does not prove the gold is legitimate, and a failed result does not prove that it was purchased.

No Public Release Yet

Illicit Riches Scanner has not been officially released to the public.

The current version was sent directly to Ziqo as a beta file.

It is unclear whether the developer plans to publish it through established WoW addon platforms later.

A wider release would almost certainly create controversy.

On one hand, the tool could help players identify obviously suspicious accounts. On the other, incomplete statistics could lead to legitimate players being publicly labeled as gold buyers without solid evidence.

More than anything, the addon shows how seriously parts of the WoW Forever community are taking the RMT issue.

Blizzard wants to crack down harder on illicit gold trading, and now at least one player has built an unofficial “tax audit” system to help the community do some checking of its own.