Deleting all cookies in temporary internet files folder

Deleting Cookies
Cookies are little bits of data that are stored on your PC by certain websites when you visit them,basically it helps the site load faster when you re-visit again,deleting them wont do any harm and is a good thing to do as if you leave them you will eventually end up with hundreds of thousands of the things and this uses up disc space and could slow your PC down..

Deleting cookies regularly will also prevent some spyware, by removing tracking cookies. The problem is, that I once deleted all my cookies, and then had to sign into all the sites that I had previously gotten into automatically, including A2K.

I found a way to get around this. I installed an anti-spyware program called "Counter-Spy":

http://www.tucows.com/preview/390726.html

http://www.pcworld.com/reviews/article/0,aid,119572,pg,2,00.asp

The program finds the spyware, and gives you options as to whether you want to remove them or not. Each spyware cookie is evaluated as to how problematical it is to the computer user. I remove everything except those that the program has rated as low problem. This seems to work very well for me.

Everyone usin' Windows should take a look at Microsoft Security At Home. Anyone using Windows 98 or later who has not already done so should update Internet Explorer to the latest version, IE 6 SP1, which has a number of very important security and privacy features. Among these features is very good cookie control. See Microsoft: How to Manage Cookies in Internet Explorer 6. Users of Windows XP, which includes IE6, should, if not already done, at the very least update to Windows XP SP1. The current Windows XP Service Pack is SP2. The easiest way to keep Windows up to date is through Windows Update.

A number of freeware programs offer very good cookie control as well, along with other important security and privacy features of great benefit. I highly recommend Zone Labs Free ZoneAlarm, which affords very flexible, customizeable cookie control, and PepiMK Software's Spybot Search & Destroy, which should be used along with JavaCool Software's SpywareBlaster. Usin' these together will afford a great deal of control over cookies, browser helpers, and other add-ons and plug-ins. Another excellent freeware application is LavaSoft's Free Ad-Aware SE, which, though it does not actively control cookies, is very good at detectin' and cleanin' 'em up - along with lotsa other stuff you don't want on your machine. Microsoft Windows AntiSpyware is available to users of Windows XP, and is excellent as well, particularly used in combination with the above. An ounce of prevention and all that, ya know..

Thank you one and all for your informative responses to my questions. I truly appreciate it.

And welcome to a2k, Mr. Hanger. Stick around and check out the rest of the site - it has a wide range of topics and opinions given.

I just want to point out that cookie "spyware" does not exist. This is a misconception that many anti-spyware software titles are responsible.

Cookies are just plain text files. They are used to track information. As with any medium for tracking information it can be used maliciously. But the cookie itself won't do anything, it's a text file.

Anti-spyware software authors like to boast the most removals, and since there are a lot of cookies on most computers they can get a lot of "hits" from them. What they want to avoid is something like "program x removed 14,000 baddies from my computer, yours only removed 200" (with the difference largely being innocuous cookies).

For those reasons spyware software label any ad server's cookies as a "tracking" cookie. This is idiocy. ALL cookies are "tracking" cookies. That's the only point of a cookie.

By targeting these cookies they hurt a lot of honest webmasters. After all, many are paid upon the basis of a referral and the cookie is the most common way in which a referal is credited.

Bookmarking to review Timbers post in the future.

ossobuco, belated thanks for the welcome.

You're welcome, Cliff....