Security—for the information on your smart phone, as well as for the phone itself—is a hot topic these days.The truth is that you're packing a lot of sensitive information on your phone, and you should keep it safe.

    When it comes to physical security, iPhone users would do well to download Find My iPhone, a free app from Apple that allows you to visit a website and see your (lost, stolen or misplaced) phone on the map.You can then sound an alarm, send a message that will pop up on its screen, lock the phone or erase all your data.

    Android does not have an exact equivalent(等价物), but there are plenty of alternatives. A free app called Lookout offers the find­my­phone feature.The paid version allows you to wipe the data from your phone remotely.

    Then there is your coffee shop's Wi­Fi network.Anyone with minimal technical expert skill can snoop on(窥视) people using shared wireless networks, harvesting passwords and other personal data. Lookout will caution you when you've logged on to an insecure network, but cannot protect you once you're there.

    In order to protect yourself on such networks, you can use a virtual private network, or VPN. This turns all your activity into nonsense to anyone trying to read along with you from across Starbucks. It also keeps websites from tracking you and, if you're travelling, allows you to get access to sites that may be blocked in other countries.

    If you have an iPhone, the simplest VPN app is probably Hotspot Shield, whose distinguishing feature is said to be that it automatically kicks in each time you start browsing (浏览), as opposed to other VPN apps that require you to start them up manually(手动地)．This matters, because even if you decide you want a VPN app, you want to spend approximately zero time thinking about it. For the most part, that was true of Hotspot Shield, though occasionally it took a while to connect or temporarily lost connection without warning. I found myself having to turn the app on and off sometimes, which involved setting my phone constantly.

    If even reading about the settings on your phone drive you crazy, then it is probably best to stay away from a VPN app. But if you're the type who can't resist checking your bank balance from your corner bar, the hassle(麻烦) may be preferable to the risk.

    Studies show that you may be lied to every day anywhere from 10 to 200 times. We say, “Nice song.” “Honey, you don't look fat in that, no.” But another study showed that strangers lied three times within the first 10 minutes of meeting each other. We lie more to strangers than we lie to coworkers. Men lie eight times more about themselves than they do about other people. Women lie more to protect other people. If you're married, you're going to lie to your wife/ husband in one out of every 10 communications. If you're unmarried, that number drops to three. But look, if at some point you got lied to, it's because you agreed to get lied to. Truth about lying: lying's a cooperative act. Not all lies are harmful. Sometimes we're willing to get lied to for social dignity(尊严), maybe to keep a private secret.

    Lying is complex. It exists in our daily and business lives. We're deeply disturbed by the truth. We explain it, sometimes for very good reasons, other times just because we don't understand the gaps between ideals and realities in our lives. We're against lying, but secretly we're for it in ways that our society has practiced for centuries and centuries. It's as old as breathing. It's part of our culture and history. Think the stories from Dante, Shakespeare, the Bible, News of the World.

    Lying has great value to the evolution of human beings. Researchers have long known that the more intelligent the species, the more likely it is to lie. We humans like to become leaders. It starts really early. How early? Well, babies will pretend to cry, pause, wait to see who's coming and then go right back to crying. One-year-olds learn hiding truth. Five-year-olds lie outright and try to control through flattery (奉承). Nine-year-olds, masters of covering up.

    So what do we do about lies? Well, there are steps we can take to guide our way through the bushes. Trained lie spotters (检测员) get to the truth 90% of the time. The rest of us, we're only 54% right. There are clever liars and stupid liars, but there're no real creative liars. While lying, we all make the same mistakes, and we all use the same techniques.

    The Israeli farmers who pioneered the revolutionary technology known as drip irrigation weren't trying to solve one of the world's most urgent problems．They were just trying to survive．They lived in the desert，and they didn't have enough water to grow their crops．

    In its simplest form, it was little more than a pipe with holes in it. But behind each hole was a hi-tech dripper that let out just the right amount of water. Snaked along a row of crops so that the holes were positioned directly above the roots, the pipe could direct each precious drop of water directly to the plants, getting a bigger harvest while using a very small amount of the water．

    Over time, the farmers improved upon the technology, perfecting the drippers that regulated the flow of water, and connecting the pipelines to computers that could determine exactly how much water each plant needed and when．

    If the global population kept growing, the rest of the world would increasingly resemble their little community in the desert. So they began selling their irrigation systems in other parts of the world，eventually expanding to more than 110 countries. Netafirm, the company says it's lifting people out of poverty and conserving water at a time when the importance of doing so has never been clearer．

    The mass adoption of drip irrigation won't save the world by itself. To avoid the coming catastrophe, nearly everybody will, in some way, have to do more with less, perhaps through accepting and using other new technologies. Otherwise, it's going to get ugly．

阅读下列短文，从每题所给的四个选项（A、B、C和D）中，选出最佳选项。

    Green is an important color in nature. It is the color of grass and the leaves on trees. It is also the color of most growing plants.

    Sometimes, the word “green” means young, fresh and growing. For example, a greenhorn is someone who has no experience. In the 15th century, a greenhorn was a young cow or an ox whose horns(角)had not yet developed. A century later, a greenhorn was a soldier who had no experience in war. By the 18th century, a greenhorn had the meaning it has today—a person who is new in a job.

    Someone who is good at growing plants is said to have a green thumb(大拇指). The expression comes from the early 20th century. A person with a green thumb can make plants grow quickly and well.

    Green is also the color used to describe the powerful feeling , jealousy(嫉妒). The green-eyed monster （怪物）is not a dangerous animal from outer space. It is an expression used about 400 years ago by the British writer William Shakespeare in his play “Othello”. It describes the unpleasant feeling when someone has something he wants. For example, a young man may suffer from the green-eyed monster if you get a pay rise and he does not.

    In most places in the world, a green light means to move ahead. In everyday speech, a green light means agree to continue with a project.

    My mother raised me as best as she could, taking on odd jobs in the neighborhood for money. Still without a father to tell me how to act and what was expected of me, I felt lost. I wandered for years and got involved with tough guys on the East Side of New York. They would fight madly over a dropped coin. They would steal to get what they wanted. I wanted to be like them.

    It was lucky for me that I left the city and entered a world of discipline (纪律), after following my mother's advice. During three years of military service, I had time to rethink my life, and my thoughts often ran to my mother. I realized suddenly just how much of a heartache I must have been to her, how little I had noticed her suffering. When my father left this world, my mother was completely alone. To support us, my mother cleaned apartments and took in washing and ironing from the neighbors. And as she worked hard at this labor, she kept her head high. Each week she would bring a pile of books home from the library and read to us. My mother had wanted nothing more, than for me to turn into an honest responsible man. But I had acted against her. Finally, almost too late I had the sense to feel shame.

    Ten years passed and I returned to the apartment on the East Side. I knew I wouldn't fall back in with the wrong people, although I still wasn't sure where I was heading. My mother, I could tell, was worried about me. In my neighborhood, to become a police officer or a firefighter was a mark of significant social success and achievement. For me it was an opportunity for a real start in life. I wondered if I was up to it, but I knew that it was time to try. When I found myself in the big hall raising my hands to take the firefighters oath (誓言) of office, my mother was sitting a few rows behind with a smile of relief. She knew that at last I was off on life's road and moving steadily. Her smile said, “My job is finally done.”

    Buddy or Friendship Benches (长椅)are needed because playgrounds can be lonely places sometimes. When a school places the bench, they teach a little lesson to the kids on how it is to be used. Then when a child sits on the bench, it sends out a message to others that basically says, " Hey, I'm alone right now and would welcome the company (陪伴) of others." Kids in the playground see this and from their training, they see there is a fellow student in need. They are encouraged to come over and sit on the bench and make a new friend.

    Benches like this have been around for a while now in many schools. But in Ireland, they are trying to do something different with them. This school in Cork in the south of Ireland is the 247th to get benches from a social organization called "Buddy Bench Ireland" that doesn't just provide schools with benches, but also runs special projects with trained child psychiatrists (精神病专家).They use the bench as an opportunity to start conversations about mental health. They talk about the importance of knowing and understanding your feelings and those of others.

    Judith Ashton, a co-founder of Buddy Bench Ireland said, "The children need to understand what the bench is about, what it represents —friendship, understanding, listening to each other and the most important thing is that it's important to express feelings."

    But do children really use the bench? It's a matter of great public concern. Sinead Mcgilloway from Maynooth University carried out a study and said, " We found that 40% of the children told us that they had actually used the benches at the time of the study. And over 90% said that they would talk to a child if that child was sitting on the bench. So, there's nothing to worry about.

    Children's mental health and safety at school is increasingly a concern in many countries. In Ireland, they're hoping these benches will not only tackle problems like school violence and school bullying (校园暴力和校园欺凌), but also give students the confidence to open up about their feelings.