Your experience isn’t wrong, it is more likely to happen, however, if you prioritize portability, SD Cards and USBs are great for that and inconspicuous if you go somewhere public or need to share something with someone at school without drawing too much attention.
This is why I have a USB Hub and MicroSD cards for drives that aren’t OS related.
I have
256GB Mac
256GB “Work In Progress” microSD Card (torrents, files I am working on, encoding, etc.)
2 1TB MicroSD Cards for DRM Purchases (iTunes and Apple TV) + Non DRM content (content I ripped and encoded to convert to digital and podcasts, audio, video, etc.)
I just really like the portability of SD Cards and USB sticks.
Your experience isn’t wrong, it is more likely to happen, however, if you prioritize portability, SD Cards and USBs are great for that and inconspicuous if you go somewhere public or need to share something with someone at school without drawing too much attention.