A computer prank is nothing but a prank, related to computers. You might have already come across computer pranks many times while you were playing different things with your computer. Here’s a simple activity that you can try from your homes, using your computer, to get an idea about computer pranks. First of all, you should take the screenshot of your desktop and save the image somewhere in your computer. Don’t forget the location where you saved the image file. After that, you should be deleting the icons on your desktop. Now you should be changing the desktop background to the one that you have just created by taking the snapshot of your desktop. After you apply changes, you will be seeing icons on your desktop. But you won’t be able to click them. You will be getting pissed off with it, until you realize that it was an image and not a real icon. This is actually a simple example of a computer prank. You would have come across computer pranks like the one that we have just mentioned above, many times. But the thing is we don’t remember these kinds of silly things. That’s the reason why many of us don’t have any idea about computer pranks.
Forms of Computer Pranks
Computer pranks can be of different forms. They can be related to both the hardware as well as software of a computer system. The word itself will tell you what it stands for. But in order to get a complete idea regarding what it is, you should be an expert who knows much about computers and its working. Computer pranks can be humorous as well as scary. At the same time, some computer pranks can even make you nuts. So, depending on the type of computer prank, the effect it brings in you will vary.
Computer pranks of scary nature are generally related with flash videos. In such computer pranks, there will be an unexpected ending or an unexpected scene at the middle of a flash video, comprising of scary music and shots. Such a sudden change brought in the video, will surely scare anyone. This can be taken as a computer prank since it is done using computers. And since it is done using computer software, it can also be called as a software prank. These days, computer pranks are created using gif images as well. And that might be due to the reason that these can be downloaded by anyone who is having a decent internet connection. Not just that, making computer pranks using gif images is pretty easy than making one using flash videos.
Popularity of Computer Pranks
People have started to employ computer pranks in sites like youtube and such. Since these sites are viewed by millions of people all over the world, computer pranks have started to gain much popularity among the mass. For the same reason, it is now a must for computer geeks to make them aware regarding how to spot such pranks. In sites like youtube, you will be seeing a comments section under every video. Before planning to watch a video, you should be going through the comments section in order to make sure that there won’t be any computer pranks.
You should be doing this only if you are thinking of spotting computer pranks. It is a good idea to spot computer pranks since people have a tendency to express their comments about videos that they have already viewed. This way, if there is any type of computer prank in a video uploaded at youtube or any such sites, then the comments section would be really handy for you.
Fake Computer Viruses Pranks
Computer pranks can be in the form of fake computer viruses as well. People who are used to computers a bit more than others usually fool their friends with the help of computer pranks. One of the easiest methods adopted by such computer geeks for fooling their friends is the use of fake computer viruses. Such fake computer viruses are created with the help of computer pranks. Making such fake computer viruses is pretty easy if you know the basics of using a computer. First of all you should be planning whom to fool. After that, you should be having access to that person’s computer. You should be renaming a commonly used computer program with the extension .txt – but before doing that, you must be keeping the original file somewhere safe. The best place to keep the original file is in the system folder which can be found under the windows folder in your windows main drive. You should be renaming the copied file and not the original file.
Once you have renamed the file, you can edit it using a text editor like notepad or something like that. When you open the file using notepad, you will be seeing lines similar to “you can open this only under dos” or something like that. Edit that line to something like “Congrats: your system has got sick with a harmful virus. You can never delete the virus and thus will be there forever” or anything else that you prefer.
After you have done the editing, you can yourself ask your friend to open the file or wait for your friend to open it. Seeing the sudden changes in the program that he normally opens, he will be shocked for sure. After making sure that, he has been shocked as you wanted, you can tell him that it is nothing but a computer prank that you have created yourself for fooling him.
These kinds of computer pranks can make you a computer geek who knows the inside out of a computer. You can simply boast off your skills with your friends and can be proud regarding the same. The examples of computer pranks that we have mentioned here are simple ones. You can think of something which is better than what we have explained above. This way, you will also be able to develop complex computer pranks just like the pros. Doing so, you can even make yourself aware regarding computer pranks and things that you should be doing in order to spot computer pranks at the very first glance.
