Evil Week 2016: The Complete Series

Last week, we explored the darker side of life hacking during our ever-controversial Evil Week. For those who missed out, we’re assembled every naughty post in one place. It’s all here — from disabling drones in mid-flight to the legalities of selling your virginity online.

How To Get Rich Tricking People Into Buying Overpriced Weight Loss Shakes
Are you ready to make a ton of money and sell a ton of shakes? It won’t be an easy path, but people trying to succeed in this business are everywhere these days. If you haven’t gotten an invite to a health challenge or seen friends posing with shakes on social media… well, congrats! You’ve got a ton of fresh customers ready to hear your pitch.

How To Lie To Yourself And Others With Statistics
Misusing statistics is one of the most powerful ways to lie. Normally, we teach you how to avoid misinterpreting statistics, but knowing how numbers are manipulated can help you spot when it happens. To that end, we’re going to show you how to make data say whatever the hell you want to back up any wrong idea you have.

Top Ten Careers That Attract Psychopaths
If you’ve been in the workplace for any extended period of time, chances are you’ve encountered a psychopath at some point in your career. Contrary to popular belief, not all psychopaths are serial killers or axe murderers. In fact, only a small majority of psychopaths are actually violent at all. Instead, you’ll find that psychopaths will almost always be superficially charming, yet can prove to be self-serving and callous on closer inspection. Thanks to the specific set of traits that defines psychopathy, they’re far more likely to be drawn to certain careers than to others.

How To Catfish Someone On The Internet (Or Spot Someone Doing It To You)
A ‘catfish’ is someone who uses the anonymity of the internet to create a fake online identity. Usually, the aim is to lure somebody into a romantic relationship; either to fleece them out of money, for personal gratification or simply to mess with their heads. It’s a terrible practice that can lead to heartache and financial ruin. In related news, welcome to Evil Week!

How To String Along Annoying Scam Callers
I got one of the sadly frequent scam calls the other day from “Windows Consumer care”, telling me about a “serious problem” with my computer. Rather than angrily hang up, I kept the call going as long as possible. Here’s why.

Convince Someone That Your Dumb Idea Is True By Simply Repeating It Over And Over
There’s an old adage that when you repeat a lie enough, it becomes the truth. Psychologists call the illusory truth effect. BBC Future digs into how it works, why it works and why it doesn’t.

Get Free, Unlimited Wi-Fi On Flights And Bypass Paywalls
In-flight Wi-Fi is wonderful. The price to use it on the other hand, not so great. There are a few methods to get free access, but these two are relatively simple. The first requires only an iPhone. The second requires either a VPS or server you control. They both result in free, unlimited access for the whole flight.

Tweak A Sodastream To Use Cheaper CO2 Containers
Owning a SodaStream is awesome, especially if you’re a carbonated water lover (and I am). Shelling out for those proprietary tanks and refills though, knowing that cheaper CO2 is widely available, isn’t. Luckily, it’s not difficult to hack your SodaStream and save a ton of money.

How To Make Someone’s Computer Shut Down Automatically
If you really want to make somebody rage against their own machine, you can use this one simple command to make a PC shut down automatically after a given amount of time. You can it run straight from the Start Menu in Windows.

Five Ways To Cheat Your Way To 10,000 Fitbit Steps Every Day
Some days you just don’t have the time or energy to get your 10,000 recommended steps in. These tricks won’t help you keep active, but they will make sure you keep your numbers up.

How To ‘Fake’ Charisma Like Jimmy Fallon
Jimmy Fallon may be a polarising figure on the internet, but he can bring in the ratings. Some believe he’s fake, while others are drawn to his charisma. This video breaks down how to emulate that charisma on your own.

How To Fake ‘Before And After’ Fitness Photos
We’ve all seen those transformation photos of people going from pufferfish-like bellies to enviously defined abs. You may have mused, “I wish I could get to that ‘After’ picture, too.” Oh, but you can. Without actually being close to that great a shape, in fact. It’s not honest, but marketers do it, and hot damn, you will look fabulous.

‘Break’ Your Co-Workers’ Keyboards By Enabling Filter Keys On Their PCs
By turning on one feature that is on every Windows computers, you can make your workmates think there’s something wrong with their keyboards.

Send Your Enemies An Actual Bag Of Dicks To Eat
“Eat a bag (or bowl) of dicks” is one of my favourite insults ever but, until very recently, it’s been used in a mostly hyperbolic sense. That’s all about to change though, as you can now send a bag of gummy dicks to anyone, with instructions on what you’d like the recipient to do with them.

This DIY Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) Generator Is Simple To Build, Fries Small Electronics
If you want to get your hands dirty on a semi-evil electronics project, this DIY EMP generator is fun – if not a little dangerous – build to try. It won’t fry much, except at extreme short range, so you should be careful with it, but you’ll learn a lot in the process.

The USB Killer: Fryer Of Motherboards
The USB Killer is infamous (but ingenious). Plug it in, and within seconds your computer is dead, motherboard fried thanks to a high voltage dose of electricity, along with any other nearby components. This video shows you how it works, but the takeaway is clear: Never connect random USB devices to your computer.

Horrify Non-Australians With These Rare And Dangerous Beasties
Australia is notorious for its menagerie of venomous and man-eating animals. While most foreigners are aware of the saltwater croc, brown snake, white pointer and funnel-web spider, there are countless other critters lurking in the Aussie wilderness that are equally unpleasant and/or deadly. Here’s a handy bestiary to show overseas friends and relatives who you’d prefer never visited.

How To Cover Your Tracks When Snooping On Someone’s Phone Or Computer
If you’re going to snoop on someone’s personal, digital property, you want to make sure you don’t leave behind any sort of trail. Here are some tips on how you can get in and out without leaving behind any damning evidence.

Build Your Own Wi-Fi Drone Disabler With A Raspberry Pi
If you’re looking for an interesting project to work on this weekend, you can turn a Raspberry Pi into a device that will drop Wi-Fi controlled drones right out of the sky with just a tap of your finger.

Is It Legal To Sell Your Virginity?
Every now and then, you’ll hear news reports of somebody trying to sell their virginity online. Most recently, a 20-year old student from Russia is auctioning off her virginity so she can raise funds to study abroad. People are willing to pay big bucks to pop somebody’s cherry, sometimes these numbers can reach hundreds of thousands of dollars. But is it legal to sell your virginity in Australia? Let’s find out.

Sneak Money Out Of A Piggy Bank With A Butter Knife
If you accidentally slipped a few too many coins in your piggy bank and don’t feel like breaking it open to get them back, use this trick instead.

Get One ‘Free’ Refund From Every Online Store
Most online retailers are keen to keep their customers happy. Unfortunately, postal services are not known for their reliability and sometimes stuff goes missing during transit. When you put these two facts together, it’s usually not that difficult to score a refund by claiming a shipped product never arrived on your doorstep. The way you use this knowledge is up to you.


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