YOU know that file you deleted from your computer before your significant other had a chance to find it?
What if we told you that file never really disappeared?
That's right, just because you move a file to the trash doesn't mean it has actually been deleted.
And even once you empty the trash, the space inhabited by the file isn't actually emptied. When you hit "delete" that file doesn't disappear. It is simply marked as empty.
Michael from YouTube channel VSauce explains that "the file's home becomes available real estate but the file itself hasn't actually moved out. Only the pointers have gone away."
What are pointers, you ask? Pointers are a kind of data that point to places in your computer's memory where the file you are referencing can be found.
Deleting a file is the equivalent of turning to the contents page of a book and marking a chapter as empty, even though the actual chapter still exists.
Which is why you need to "overwrite" the file. Overwriting the file is the equivalent of turning it into Frankenstein's monster. You keep adding new data to it until it becomes unrecognisable.
However, overwriting doesn't always work. Some people have overwritten files more than 35 times and even then hackers and cyber criminals have been able to piece the information back together.
So the next option is shredding - physically taking apart your computer piece by piece and maybe putting it through some high powered magnet for good measure.
But much like shredded pieces of paper can actually be put back together, so too can shredded computer parts.
The video explains that cyber criminals have been able to find classified files from the US government in digital dumping grounds in Ghana.
So basically, nothing is permanently gone. And the best way to keep your data safe is to keep the hard drives of your old computers before ditching, donating or selling it, because you never know where your data can end up.
And then take to it with a hammer or some gasoline and a match.
Watch the video above for a more detailed explanation.
The 'selfie' (right) was posted online by Riccardo Arcelli. On the left the pope can be seen posing with Arcelli and his friends during their visit to the Vatican. Picture: AP/Riccardo Aguiari
POPE Francis has broken protocol once again, appearing with a puzzled look on his face in a "selfie" photo taken with a group of teenagers visiting the Vatican.
The picture appeared on the Facebook page of one of the youngsters, who used it as his profile picture, and was going viral on social media on Saturday. The picture comes in the same week that the Oxford English Dictionary included the word "selfie" to denote a self-taken photograph on a smartphone. The young believers were part of a church group from northern Italy who met with the leader of the world's 1.2 billion Catholics on Wednesday and were seen going up to him afterwards to take their photo. "There is no marketing behind these actions. The Pope clearly likes being with people while his predecessor liked being with books," said Beppe Severgnini, columnist for the Corriere della Sera daily. The 76-year-old Pope, Latin America's first pontiff, has repeatedly broken with Vatican tradition since being elected in March, including regularly picking up the phone and calling ordinary people who write to him. The photo prompted bemused reactions on Twitter, with one user saying "Now I've seen everything" and another quipping: "It's the end of the world as we know it." One unenthused tweeter commented: "Just because Pope Francis poses for a 'selfie', doesn't make it okay!"
A bunker being eroded by the Atlantic at Cap Breton. Picture: Reuben Wu
UK photographer Rueben Wu likes to shoot abandoned places.
Wu is a musician from UK electro band, Ladytron, whose fame has allowed him access to some places of the world few of us will ever get to see.
He says that he has become attracted to the "dark and hidden things which most people have forgotten about," he tells Gizmodo.
These places include a long abandoned research base in Norway's arctic archipelago of Svalbard, observatories in Chile's Atacama Desert, a series of coastal forts built by the Nazis along western Europe and Scandinavia between 1942-1945, sea forts along the English Channel built during World War II to monitor Nazi aircraft and "sound mirrors" built to detect early radar signals.
Wu says he is interested in shooting places where "humans don't belong".
World War II Nazi surveillance sea forts built by the British. Picture: Reuben Wu
These British sea-forts were built to spy on Nazi aircraft during World War II. Picture: Reuben Wu
"I was interested primarily in settlements in remote and extreme locations, the scarcity of light over winter and the strangeness of the landscape," he told travel blog The Island Review.
Svalbard in particular is not a place of comfort, he says. "It is the only place in the world where natural burial is illegal, as the environmental conditions mean that dead bodies simply will not decompose."
"Humans don't belong there and they can't survive without huge effort," he said. "I found that I had stopped thinking about life at home and had become completely absorbed by the environment - a bizarre sensory deprivation where I became unable to judge the existence of anything apart from the shape of my travelling companion in front of me."
An abandoned building in Barentsburg, Svalbard. Picture: Reuben Wu
Grave sites in Chile's Atacama Desert. Picture: Reuben Wu
Wu's obsession with abandoned places stems from the writing of JG Ballard, Philip K Dick and the films of Andrei Tarkovsky and their stories and themes of "ruin, decay and time". "I think abandoned buildings separate themselves from their original purpose of existence by the path of time," he said. "They signify that everything will come to an end, and we only have a short time to look around before we die." Check out some of Wu's photos below, or on his Facebook, blog and professional website, and next time, before you miss the train, remember how lucky we are not to be living at the end of the world.
Some kind of abandoned machinery in Svalbard.
A UK and US nuclear climatic test chamber in Suffolk, England.
A nuclear climatic test chamber reclaimed by rabbits in Suffolk, England.
An atomic weapons research establishment at an early radar test site at Orford Ness.
A torch marking a Russian settlement in Barentsburg, Svalbard.
A long since abandoned ship trapped in ice
A silhouetted figured in Última Esperanza, a southern province of Chile meaning "Last Hope Province.
Samsung took screen size to a ridiculous new level with the Galaxy Note, offering us a huge 5.3-inch display that's by far the largest of any smartphone out there today.
Now that trick has been taken to the next level, by offering a 5.5-inch screen within the same footprint. The S Pen Stylus has been updated to include more than 1,000 pressure sensitivity levels, and the screen resolution is impressively boosted, too.
As with many of Samsung's Android phones, the Note II is a solid performer, and also came complete with Android Jelly Bean out of the box, along with updates to the Touchwiz overlay. The Super AMOLED HD Plus resolution, combined with a more intuitive S Pen and greater range of software, shows we writers don't always know what we're talking about: Samsung has made a success of a category most of us had written off.
Quick verdict
A great phone, as long as you're not easily embarrassed by whipping out something so comically huge in public. The power and customization may be too much for some, but for others this is the hypercharged handset they'll want to try.
4. Google Nexus 4
Google and LG have worked together to bring to market a fantastic offering, one that even Apple fans can't help but coo over when they hear the price.
The fact of the matter is that this is a handset with world class specs – yet it's at a cost you'd expect to get a budget phone for. Sure, there are a few things that could have been done better, but the positives definitely outweigh the negatives
The Nexus 4 is beautifully designed with a stunning display and rocking the latest version of Android. It has more connectivity than a telephone exchange and even excels in the simple matter of making calls. We're not fans of the lower memory allowance, and it's not got the best screen on the market, and there will be a few that see stock Android 4.2 as too stripped-down to consider it a valid phone OS choice, but that doesn't mean it's not a fantastic handset - it would have competed even without the insanely low price tag.
Quick verdict
Make no mistake – this is the best Nexus handset so far by a long shot. We love it and can't recommend it highly enough.
3. Sony Xperia Z
Sony's new handset is most definitely the most impressive the firm has launched either in its current guise or as Sony Ericsson. You can see the Sony influence throughout the handset as it oozes quality and build from the large screen, which fits close to the edges of the bezel, to the intelligent camera that allows you to snap some really premium photos without needing to fiddle about with the settings. And it's water and dust resistant too, which makes it excellent for general life business, plus it's packing a microSD card slot in an impossibly thin chassis, for which we laud the phone even higher. Add to that the Bravia Engine 2, which can upscale standard definition movies and bring your content to life, and you've got a real matchwinning phone in your hands.
Quick verdict
While it doesn't quite pack the clout of the phones from HTC and Samsung, the Xperia Z is a phone that says Sony is definitely back at the sharp end of the smartphone game. There's still (a small amount of) room for improvement, as the screen can look a bit washed out from some angles, but there's no doubt that if Sony keeps us this pace it will be vying for the top spot in no time at all - we just don't know what Sony will call it.
4. Google Nexus 4
Google and LG have worked together to bring to market a fantastic offering, one that even Apple fans can't help but coo over when they hear the price. The fact of the matter is that this is a handset with world class specs – yet it's at a cost you'd expect to get a budget phone for. Sure, there are a few things that could have been done better, but the positives definitely outweigh the negatives. The Nexus 4 is beautifully designed with a stunning display and rocking the latest version of Android. It has more connectivity than a telephone exchange and even excels in the simple matter of making calls. We're not fans of the lower memory allowance, and it's not got the best screen on the market, and there will be a few that see stock Android 4.2 as too stripped-down to consider it a valid phone OS choice, but that doesn't mean it's not a fantastic handset - it would have competed even without the insanely low price tag.
Quick verdict
Make no mistake – this is the best Nexus handset so far by a long shot. We love it and can't recommend it highly enough.
Sony's new handset is most definitely the most impressive the firm has launched either in its current guise or as Sony Ericsson. You can see the Sony influence throughout the handset as it oozes quality and build from the large screen, which fits close to the edges of the bezel, to the intelligent camera that allows you to snap some really premium photos without needing to fiddle about with the settings. And it's water and dust resistant too, which makes it excellent for general life business, plus it's packing a microSD card slot in an impossibly thin chassis, for which we laud the phone even higher. Add to that the Bravia Engine 2, which can upscale standard definition movies and bring your content to life, and you've got a real matchwinning phone in your hands.
Quick verdict
While it doesn't quite pack the clout of the phones from HTC and Samsung, the Xperia Z is a phone that says Sony is definitely back at the sharp end of the smartphone game. There's still (a small amount of) room for improvement, as the screen can look a bit washed out from some angles, but there's no doubt that if Sony keeps us this pace it will be vying for the top spot in no time at all - we just don't know what Sony will call it.
2. Samsung Galaxy S4
Hold the phone, what's happen here? Samsung may have been top dog in 2012, but this year the sultry stylings of the HTC One have proven too strong against a phone that's a slightly-better-version of its predecessor. Ok so it's only really looks that the S4 is too similar, and sadly that was one of the biggest issues most users had with the S3. It's not the biggest smartphone crime, but that coupled with some other minor niggles means it misses out on being number one.
There's a lot to love with the Samsung Galaxy S4 with its super sharp screen, powerful camera, long-lasting battery and fluid user interface - it's got everything you could ever want in a smartphone. It may be a little more costly than some of its direct rivals, but thankfully it's still cheaper than the iPhone. If only it was made out of something a little more premium...
Quick verdict
There's no doubt that this is one of the best smartphone ever made - it's clear, powerful and does everything we'd expect a flagship Samsung mobile to do. It's just a shame that the perceived 'innovation' doesn't really add anything, but make no mistake you'll love the Samsung Galaxy S4 if you decide to plump for it.
1. HTC One
Well, here's something of a shock if you're a Samsung fan – after nearly two years of dominance, the Korean brand has fallen from the top spot. It's nothing to do with the quality of the S4 – it's still an outstanding phone – but more the fact HTC has managed to bring out a smartphone that's worthy of any user's consideration with a supreme aluminium chassis, Full HD screen and simplified version of Sense 5.0 sitting on top of Android Jelly Bean. The new innovations are also pleasingly more than just marketing gimmicks; Zoe functionality allows the creation of delightful video highlight reels, and the Ultrapixel camera means you've got a much wider range of shots available thanks to being stunning in low light.
The only reason this isn't a five star phone is the slightly off-key battery, which can leak juice if you're power-creating videos or watching reams of video, but for day to day use it will be acceptable for most.
Quick Verdict
With power, poise and beauty all combined in this innovative phone, HTC has proved it can more than still cut it with the big boys when it comes to bringing out a lust-worthy flagship smartphone.
CNBC claims that Apple is launching its trade-in program today at retail stores nationwide in America, with no word on a worldwide release just yet, though its expected to eventually roll out.
Officially called the "iPhone Reuse and Recycling Program," iPhone users can trade in their older models, like an iPhone 3GS or iPhone 4S for a newer iPhone 5 in-store.
We noted earlier that the old phones will be shipped to Brightstar for recycling and 9to5mac has reported the same information adding that Apple is committed to American soil - rather than sending devices overseas for sales, products will be recycled in the U.S.
Apple's fine print
Of course, a few caveats remain with the program - trade-in credit is given as a gift card but the customer must use it at that time and only for an iPhone.
Additionally, they must leave the store with a new contract with the phone activated at time of purchase.
The price you'll get for your old phone will also vary.
Since numbers in the market are constantly changing, there's no telling what amount of money you can get with your iPhone 4S, however CNBC notes that there is a clear appeal with trade-in programs as you'll typically walk away with a bargain.
Fill your Home screens with the best widgets for Android
One of the exciting and innovative things about Android has always been its use of widgets, which, to the uninitiated, are best described as little live apps that are embedded into your Home screens. You can have an animating photo frame that pulls out a selection of pics from your phone's gallery, a serious news ticker, constantly updating share prices, annoying social network status updates from people you hardly know - there's a widgetised version of pretty much any type of mobile app you can think of.
What is an Android widget?
Widgets can cause a bit of confusion among newcomers to Android, as they don't open like normal apps from your phone's big list of applications. Instead, widgets are activated by long-pressing on a space on the Home screen, then installed into the nearest available slot. There are big widgets, wide widgets, little ones that only take up one standard icon slot, and there are also some absolutely terrible spam ones that look a complete mess. So here are our top 20 Android widgets to brighten up your Android phone's workspace.
1. AudioManager
It can be a little confusing delving through Android's numerous menu screens to try to find the particular setting to adjust the ring tone volume - so have it all presented as a nice widget instead.
AudioManager is nice looking, it lets you see what volume everything's at, and pops up adjustment slide bars when pressed. You life will get 0.01 percent easier with it.
2. Quick Battery
A teeny tiny one-by-one size widget, Quick Battery isn't particularly glamorous - but it does a better and prettier job of representing your phone's battery status than anything else. Plus, when installing the widget, you can choose what you want it to link to - so pressing it can open up the power settings page or... Angry Birds. Anything.
3. Extended Controls
The standard Android power strip is a useful widget that lets you quickly turn off Wi-Fi, adjust the screen brightness and toggle GPS, Bluetooth and data syncing, but Extended Controls adds more. Loads more, from one-touch USB tethering to airplane mode and even switching your phone's vibration keyboard settings on or off. Plus it's visually customisable, too.
4. ColorNote Notepad Notes
Everyone loves the classic Post-It note style of thing, and that's what ColorNote brings to your Android Home screen. Tiny post-its, one icon square, each linked to either a text note or a simple to-do list. They look cute and you can change the colours for an extra adrenaline rush.
5. Evernote
The excellent Evernote comes with a lovely little widget. While it's not visually that impressive, it adds very convenient shortcuts to your Home screen that make using the data-syncing, scheduling app even easier to use. Instant access to notes, searches, voice memos and more. Just don't judge it by its looks.
6. HTC Bookmarks
One for all the HTC owners out there. Its bookmarks widget is an excellent way to put one of your empty Home screens to use, with it giving you a full-size, scrolling list of bookmarks right there in front of your fingers. It's so useful, it's easier to quit the browser and select a link from here than navigate HTC's own in-browser bookmark system.
The latest mobile trend – cellphone upgrades every six to 12 months – is not only bad for the environment; it's also nutty
Nobody needs a new phone every six to 12 months, argues Guardian Sustainable Business editor-at-large Marc Gunther.
Can you remember life without a cellphone? In the late 1990s, only one in five Americans had one. Today, there are 102 active mobile phones or connected tablets for every 100 Americans, according to CTIA, The Wireless Association.
This is a problem for the cellphone industry. Now that the industry has sold a phone or tablet to just about everyone in the US, the challenge is to sell more of them, more often, by persuading people to get rid of the perfectly good ones they now possess and upgrade to the new new thing.
It's a classic example of consumerism run amok. Surely you've seen the marketing, which has exploded in recent months on TV and online.
"Two years is too long to wait for a new phone!" says T-Mobile, which recently introducing a replacement program called Jump! "Upgrade to the phone you want twice every 12 months, not once every two years."
"Technology doesn't wait. Neither should you," advises AT&T. Its new offering, called Next, "can get you a new device every year with no down payment, no upgrade fee, no finance fee and no activation fee".
Not to be outdone, Verizon Edge lets customers in good standing upgrade every six months.
This is not merely unsustainable. It's nutty. Really, do we need another cell phone every six or 12 months? To ask the question is to answer it.
This is not just about cellphones, of course. It's an issue for any company that seeks growth. For some consumer-products companies, the solution has been to speed up the cycle of buy it, use it, throw it away and replace it. Fast fashion has become so cheap it isn't worth bringing back to the store if it doesn't fit. The appliance repair shop and the TV repairman – familiar figures in the 1950s and 1960s – are all but extinct. The phrase "durable goods" is nearly an oxymoron.
Nor is this a new problem. For decades, companies have been trying to figure out how get consumers to buy more than they need. Back in 1955, economist Victor Lebow wrote in the Journal of Retailing:
Our enormously productive economy demands that we make consumption our way of life, that we convert the buying and use of goods into rituals, that we seek our spiritual satisfactions – and our ego satisfactions – in consumption. The measure of social status, of social acceptance, of prestige, is now to be found in our consumptive patterns. We need things consumed, burned up, worn out, replaced and discarded at an ever increasing pace.
And that was written in 1955!
It will come as no surprise that T-Mobile, AT&T and Verizon all proclaim their commitment to "sustainability". AT&T, for example, recently said it would encourage its customers to "skip the bag" when buying from its stores and would donate 10 cents to The Nature Conservancy for each bag its customers choose to forego. The company said: "As we work to make our own operations at AT&T more sustainable, we also want to empower our customers to live more sustainably." OK, but there's nothing sustainable about accelerating the upgrade cycle for cellphones.
Consider this: the EPA estimates that approximately 152m mobile devices were discarded – while just 17.4m were recycled – in 2010, the most recent year for which data is available. Back then, the standard wait for a cellphone upgrade was two years. More frequent upgrades mean more energy and materials will be needed to make new phones – and more waste will be generated.
The wireless industry's business model – under which carriers subsidize new devices in exchange for long-term service contracts – encourages rapid turnover, given that few consumers directly pay the $649 to $849 retail price for an iPhone 5 or $638 for an unlocked Samsung Galaxy S IV. If it were easier to unlock and trade phones, a more robust secondary market for used phones would ensure that fewer devices would sit unused in drawers or, worse, end up in landfills.
So what, if anything, is to be done? Can companies be expected to address this problem? Or is it up to consumers? I sought guidance from Barbara Kyle of the Electronics TakeBack Coalition and Dave Gardner, who produced and directed a film called GrowthBusters.
Kyle told me the key is more sustainable product design so that cellphones can more easily be repaired, reused and recycled, as well a more aggressive effort by companies to recapture and recycle old ones. As it happens, she said, design appears to be moving in the wrong direction – thinner phones are harder to open and repair, and tend to be held together with glue, not screws, making them more difficult to disassemble.
Nor does the industry do all it can to promote recycling. Imagine, Kyle said, if after selling a customer a new phone, all the wireless carriers sent text messages afterward offering discounts on the monthly bill and a free, downloadable mailing label to return the old one. All the carriers now offer trade-in programs in their stories, but recycling rates remain surprisingly low – roughly 10%. Sprint, for now, seems to be generating the most trade-ins, a topic to which I'll return in a future column.
Gardner agrees that companies need to think differently about design. "The next great thing might be very well be a product that can be upgraded with firmware, instead of throwing a bunch of electronics away and starting over," he told me. But he says that consumer attitudes could change, too, so that people might again value the idea of durability.
Maybe, he said, someone should start a website where people can post photos of their TV sets, microwaves or cell phones and brag about how old they are. Maybe people who are unemployed or underemployed could be trained to repair things. And maybe, he said, "the next brilliant innovative brand or product will be the one that figures out a way to make obsolescence obsolete."
