It's not just paranoia, although it conveniently serves that purpose too. I work in the industry. AV is usually kinda dogshit and resembles malware in its own right, but security patches, unfortunately, are not fake.

Using an adblocker and having some good internet instincts about what not to click on will help a lot but malware isn't just "that thing you get from public computers", it circulates online far more widely than it circulates from infected USBs, in the modern day. This is not a well informed or thought out take, and is only based on your limited experience, not any actual investigation of the topic at hand.

people genuinely do lose money and internet accounts and their identifying info to this shit all the time, just because it hasn't happened to you doesn't mean its fake. Yes, most of the people who are super worried about it know just as little about the topic as you do, but they aren't wrong to take precautions.