[quote name='nintendokid']1) How prevalent is hacking over Battle.net?[/quote]
Extremely common in every game played on BNet. But that's really only because the games are so incredibly popular and have such a gigantic playerbase.
2) Is there a way to know that someone is running a hack? People tell me that if the game lags, chances are someone is running a hack program but I don't think it's that simple, is it?
Short answer: No.
Long answer: It depends on the hack. Any hack that can get by detection is probably by default a subtle one (ie Maphack).
3) What is the best way to avoid people who use hacks when playing random games?
Short answer: There isn't one.
Long answer: If hacking/cheating/glitch exploiting bothers you, don't play games with people you don't know.
4) What are some of the more common types of hacks? I've come across only a few obvious ones such as Zerg drone cancel to get minerals, program shutdown for all players in the game, etc.
The first you describe is actually not a hack, but the exploitation of a glitch. It's
technically not cheating, in that while it may violate the "spirit" of the game, it's not actually breaking any rules.
The most common overall in Battle.net games (outside of game-specific glitches) are maphacks (see the entire map at all times) and disconnectors (cause a player to lose his connection to the game and/or crash his client).
There are many, many more with all sorts of effects, but really anything but those two are easily detected by security and the CD-keys are quickly automatically banned.
5) I was in a 2v2 Lost Temple a few days ago. I see my partner do the drone cancel. I was just about to tell the other guys and leave but immediately, the opponents both left. Was I the only legit player in this case?
Possibly, but honestly it's impossible to be completely certain.
I've mentioned "security" and hack prevention a couple times and I want to elaborate on that a bit. Blizzard uses a hack prevention protocol known as "Warden" which is effectively a proprietary Punkbuster-esque module of Battle.net. It does a number of things, the most important (and well-documented) being the constant monitoring of the memoryspace of the game you are running. Basically if this memoryspace gets violated by an outside program, it flags you as a hacker and bans you relatively quickly. It does other stuff like packet (internet transmission) monitoring, and certainly is much more robust and complex than anyone outside of its creators are capable of adequately describing.
All things considered, Warden does a very good job. There are three major caveats, however:
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Warden does not protect custom games. This is the #1 thing people don't understand. Warden is only enabled for "ladder" games. If you go into the "custom" game menu, pretty much anything goes.
Example being: I play DOTA, a custom map/mod for Warcraft 3: Frozen Throne, very frequently. I use a hack called "Custom Kick" which allows me to instantly cause any player in a game I'm hosting to lose connection to my game. The hack is actually considered to be a staple of hosting due to the prevalence of asshats who attempt to ruin matches, or laggy players who refuse to leave and thus just frustrate the legitimiate players, or players who are obivously maphacking. I have never been banned for using this hack.
However, were I to join a ladder game with Custom Kick loaded, I'd be banned within five minutes of joining. Likewise with Maphack -- though it's officially illegal and considered cheating in DOTA to maphack, it's simply not detected in Custom Games (which DOTA is) because Warden simply doesn't check Custom Games.
-Warden does not (and cannot) detect the exploitation of glitches that exist in the game code, since you're not actually attempting to modify how the game runs in any way. Thus, you will never get banned for drone cancelling in Starcraft, or killing Mephisto with the well trick in Diablo 2.
-There are a handful of hacks that have sucessfully defeated Warden. The one I'm most familiar with is the Maphack for Diablo 2, which allowed you to see the area map before you explored it. I was never banned for the use of the hack despite playing on ladder -- it was just carefully programmed not to trip Warden.
