MYTH 1:
Using a laptop on your lap will fry your *ahem* babies
I won’t bore you with an anatomy lesson, but the short of it is that your swimmers move slower and are less potent the hotter it is down there. If you noticed, the underside of laptops tend to get pretty warm when in use, and that’s with some breathing space between it and a flat surface. Remove that breathing space and you might as well be sitting in a tub on a fire pit.
MYTH 2:
Antivirus software is the end-all and be-all of security
Just like your vaccines, antivirus programs can only detect and stop the common threats they were meant for. The problem is, the more malicious and extreme attacks were coded specifically to bypass these safeguards. Browsing sites, plugging in a flash drive, and even reading a PDF file can infect your system with a virus if the hackers are deviant and ingenious enough. When you’re connected to the Internet, it’s best to assume that you’re going to get attacked.
Even international businesses get their servers hacked every once in a while. What can you do then to protect yourself? You can stop browsing the Internet’s underbelly and stick with the obvious, trustworthy sites for starters. You won’t win a new iPhone through those clickable ads. Trust me, I’ve tried.
MYTH 3:
Apple Macs are virus-free
Let me ask you something. If you were fishing and you had two spots to go to: one with tons of regular, easy to catch fish; and another with only a handful of seemingly special fish that aren’t as easy to bait; then where would you throw your line?
You’d pick the first spot, right? It’s the same with the Windows and Apple operating systems. Because the Windows OS, is more widespread, and has a wider user base, it makes sense to code a virus, malware, or spamware for the numerous Windows users. Think of it as the illegal way of dynamite fishing. You might not get them all with one stick, but at least you caught a significant amount in the blast.
MYTH 4:
Ctrl+Shift+Del will completely delete data from a drive
We’ve often been told that “Del” just sends files to the Recycle Bin, and “Ctrl+Shift+Del” permanently deletes them from our computer. While seemingly true, these aren’t fool-proof methods of erasing our data. Keying in these commands just causes our computer to hide the file entries on our displays but their remnants are still on the hard drive, retrievable using special recovery software.
That’s good news if you accidentally erase important things. If for whatever reason you’re really keen on wiping data, you should create, copy, or download files on to the drive as to overwrite what you want permanently deleted.
MYTH 5:
Computers are changing our sleep pattern
This is very true, and not just because we use computers until the wee hours of the morning, spoiling ourselves with Facebook posts and cat memes. We’re able to sleep because our body creates the hormone melatonin, the production of which is slowed down by light. That explains why we’re up and about when the sun’s out. Advances in technology have made it so that we’re never too far away from a light source, thus messing with our evolutionary programming where night time equals down time.
So should we go back to shrouding ourselves in the dark for a good night’s rest? Good one. There’s no chance we’d be putting down our gadgets for some measly sleep. We can, however, turn the screen’s brightness all the way down, as well as change its hue in order to hurt our eyes less.
MYTH 6:
I use Incognito mode. No one will ever catch me
False. If you read the fine print on the infamous incognito window of browsers—which, let’s be honest, no one really does—you’ll see that it only protects you from those using the same computer. While going incognito means that you’re browsing history, cookies, and cache won’t be saved on your system, it sure as heck won’t protect you from your company’s server and internet service provider who’ll still receive information regarding your activities. To put it simply, incognito does not mean anonymous.
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