" I've only gotten a handful of viruses or malware "
This is a variation of the bad toupee fallacy. You won't notice viruses and malware, almost by definition.
This is a variation of the bad toupee fallacy. You won't notice viruses and malware, almost by definition.
Also, in the past, I've on occasion scanned my machine using malware bytes and other tools and they always came up clean.
Of course that doesn't mean I'm in the clear but if an A / V tool doesn't detect it, then what point is there to run that A / V tool? Truthfully, it's really really easy to write a malicious tool and not have it be detected by any type of software. That's why you should be careful with downloading and running unknown software (which I am very careful of).
I suppose if my personal data was somehow used to damage someone else, that would warrant calling it malware.