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January 14th, 2008 15:00

Dell tech advised me to delete all cookies weekly. Good idea?

What do you all do about cookies?  I've had my XPS 410 a year now, and I have never deleted a cookie (only temporary internet files.)
 
So if I am brave and delete all cookies AND if I keep a list of my "user name and password" for certain web sites, will I be OK?
 
I kept my old Windows 98 for 6 years and never deleted a single cookie! No telling how many thousands of them I had...
 
But my Trend Micro is always saying I am getting a cookie that is "gray ware" (what ever that means.)   And I never know what to do about them.
 
Advice please.
 
Sara408

43 Posts

January 14th, 2008 15:00

Some cookies are "tracking" cookies, they'll send info to the author of the cookie telling you which sites you've visited.

Personally I think it's a good idea to remove all cokies once in a while, just to get a fresh start again. You wont loose anything on it.

Quote from Wikipedia:

"HTTP cookies, sometimes known as web cookies or just cookies, are parcels of text sent by a server to a web browser and then sent back unchanged by the browser each time it accesses that server. HTTP cookies are used for authenticating, tracking, and maintaining specific information about users, such as site preferences or the contents of their electronic shopping carts. The term "cookie" is derived from "magic cookie," a well-known concept in UNIX computing which inspired both the idea and the name of HTTP cookies.

Cookies have been of concern for Internet privacy, since they can be used for tracking browsing behavior. As a result, they have been subject to legislation in various countries such as the United States and in the European Union. Cookies have also been criticized because the identification of users they provide is not always accurate and because they could potentially be a target of network attackers. Some alternatives to cookies exist, but each has its own uses, advantages and drawbacks.

Cookies are also subject to a number of misconceptions, mostly based on the erroneous notion that they are computer programs. In fact, cookies are simple pieces of data unable to perform any operation by themselves. In particular, they are neither spyware nor viruses, despite the detection of cookies from certain sites by many anti-spyware products.

Most modern browsers allow users to decide whether to accept cookies, but rejection makes some websites unusable. For example, shopping baskets implemented using cookies do not work if cookies are rejected."

306 Posts

January 14th, 2008 16:00

Hi Sara,
 
I would recommend that you delete cookies, temporary internet files and temporary files on a regular basics. Also defrag your drives at least once a month. This will help with performance.
 
Mike
XPS720
Windows Vista Ultimate
McAfee Security Center
Microsoft Office 2007
Intel® Core™2 Quad Q6600 2.40 GHz 1066 MHz
4Gb Crucial DDR2 PC2-6400DDR2-800 SLI-Ready
Qty.(1) Seagate Barracuda 250Gb Hard Drive
Qty.(2) Seagate Barracuda 500Gb Hard Drive
nVidia GeForce 8800 GTX 786Mb Memory
Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Sound Card
Liteon 16X DVD-ROM
Liteon 16X DVD-RW
Broadcom 5754 Ethernet NIC NetXtreme
Dell 24" LCD Monitor
Logitec Cordless Desktop Wave Keyboard & Mouse
HP Scanjet G4010 Photo Flatbed Scanner
Canon i950s Photo Printer

99 Posts

January 14th, 2008 16:00

Most Cookies are relatively harmless and exist to remember your log-ins and passwords to sites. While wiping them out from time to time is best for security, it can be inconvenient.

I recommend you download and install CCLeaner. It is a simple, but powerful program that removes unused and temporary files from Windows machines. In it, you can see which Cookies are on your computer and tell it which ones not to delete when you run it. The program works great, costs nothing, and contains NO spyware/adware/malware.

306 Posts

January 14th, 2008 17:00

Hi,
 
That website works but only if you do it just as you have stated. There is still download link that takes you to Errorsmart. But to be fare to CCLeaner, here is what McAfee SiteAdvisor say's about their website.
 
Reviewer and Web site owner comments
User Review Summary for filehippo.com

This site is good (65)

This site spams (0)

Adware, spyware, or viruses (4)

Excessive popups (0)

Phishing or other scams (0)

Bad shopping experience (0)

Browser exploit (0)

filehippo.com Web site owner comments (0)

Are you the owner of this site? Add a comment

User Reviews (69)
   

page 1 of 7

Learn more about our reviewer system.

Rating: This site is good

A great site with a nice simple interface. Lots of good download links.

Posted at 01/04/2008-09:32:08 AM by rmckee999, Reviewer , View profile [ Reputation score: 1 / 9 ]

    Rating: This site is good

    Posted at 12/20/2007-06:00:48 PM by RogueViper101, Reviewer , View profile [ Reputation score: 1 / 9 ]

      Rating: This site is good

      BEST!No comment.Better than download.com 1000X!

      Posted at 12/17/2007-08:10:16 AM by Gex, Reviewer , View profile [ Reputation score: 1 / 9 ]

        Rating: This site is good

        Wow, this site is great! If you need some kind of freeware, or any old versions of some software, you can go here! Some times companies ruin their software with new versions of their software, but if your lucky, they just may have the old version. Don't believe these people that rate it red. The probably either don't use the site, or don't download any programs.

        Posted at 12/01/2007-09:48:56 PM by garbagefan2, Reviewer , View profile [ Reputation score: 1 / 9 ]

          Rating: This site is good

          ? its safe!?

          Posted at 11/16/2007-04:39:14 PM by Terrum, Reviewer , View profile [ Reputation score: 1 / 9 ]

            Rating: Adware, spyware, or viruses

            Yes many other people say this site is good, but would you trust any web site that knowingly lets virus on to there site?

            Posted at 10/26/2007-11:40:21 AM by AL2000, Reviewer , View profile [ Reputation score: 1 / 9 ]

              Rating: Adware, spyware, or viruses

              Posted at 10/25/2007-07:19:48 PM by ccsonyoutube, Reviewer , View profile [ Reputation score: 1 / 9 ]

                Rating: Adware, spyware, or viruses

                Posted at 10/25/2007-07:19:29 PM by ccsonyoutube, Reviewer , View profile [ Reputation score: 1 / 9 ]

                  Rating: This site is good

                  Nice site. I been d/l for 1 & a half years and never have any problem with the softwares. I gave my vote for this site. But it doesn't mean I never take precaution for any software that I download. I 'google' it first before I d/l from this site, to make sure it really safe, especially the first time I'm using the software.

                  Posted at 10/22/2007-03:01:26 PM by yeepikaye, Reviewer , View profile [ Reputation score: 1 / 9 ]

                    Rating: This site is good

                    Excellent Site! Very safe to use and to get latest you should use it frequently and very few people say it unsafe so it's safe too.

                    Posted at 10/21/2007-05:50:16 AM by John boss, Reviewer , View profile [ Reputation score: 1 / 9 ]

                    14.4K Posts

                    January 14th, 2008 17:00

                    It does work but it can be dangerous if you don't know what you are doing. It is like a lot of reg cleaners you have to have some knowledge of files that are safe to remove and those that are not..I use it on very rare occasions..


                    Message Edited by Davet50 on 01-14-2008 02:12 PM

                    99 Posts

                    January 14th, 2008 17:00

                    My apologies, here is a direct link. Click "Download Latest Version" in the upper-right corner. Whatever you do, don't download that Error thing. I have no idea what that is. Yes the program does include a registry editor, but you don't have to use it. If you ever decide to clean your registry, you can back-up before making any changes.

                    Message Edited by LupercalH on 01-14-2008 01:51 PM

                    933 Posts

                    January 14th, 2008 17:00

                    Too many cookies will slow you down big time I make it a point to get rid of all cookies at least once a week sooner if i do a lot of surfing I do a disk clean up and then delete all cookies and then defrag .
                     
                    Bob Moyer

                    107 Posts

                    January 14th, 2008 17:00

                    it will speed things up a little bit, just make sure you remember all ur site passwords! :smileyvery-happy:
                     
                    i try defrag every once in a while but i rarely have the required 15% free hard drive space

                    306 Posts

                    January 14th, 2008 17:00

                    Hi Luper,
                     
                    I tried your link, it does take you to the CClearner website, but when you click download it takes you to a different product called Errorsmart. From what I read about it does not perform as you stated. I have McAfee SiteAdvisor installed, and all comments about ErrorSmart Website were negative. I'm not to sure about this, I would not use it. But that just my opinion.
                     
                    Copied from McAfee SiteAdvisor:
                     
                    Reviewer and Web site owner comments
                    User Review Summary for errorsmart.com

                    This site is good (0)

                    This site spams (0)

                    Adware, spyware, or viruses (2)

                    Excessive popups (0)

                    Phishing or other scams (0)

                    Bad shopping experience (5)

                    Browser exploit (0)

                    errorsmart.com Web site owner comments (0)

                    Are you the owner of this site? Add a comment

                    User Reviews (9)

                    page 1 of 1

                    Learn more about our reviewer system.

                    Rating: Adware, spyware, or viruses

                    Dodgy site.

                    Posted at 01/02/2008-08:37:20 PM by SeanW, Reviewer , View profile [ Reputation score: 6 / 9 ]

                      Rating: Bad shopping experience

                      not good

                      Posted at 01/02/2008-03:00:59 PM by shahab123, Reviewer , View profile [ Reputation score: 1 / 9 ]

                        Rating: Bad shopping experience

                        I clicked on an ad for windows anti-spyware. The landing went through at least one redirection before coming to rest at errorsmart.com. I read through the site and, as a reviewer noted below, could not find any contact information or physical location. When I looked up the domain, it was registered by proxy. These two things taken together prove that buying from this site will likely result in a bad shopping experience.

                        Posted at 12/27/2007-03:07:20 AM by TangoU, Reviewer , View profile [ Reputation score: 4 / 9 ]


                          Posted at 11/20/2007-07:39:26 PM by BlakeC, Reviewer , View profile [ Reputation score: 2 / 9 ]

                            Rating: Bad shopping experience

                            Misleading and deceptive. The site is trying to sell products by associating third party products with biggies. Moreover even when you r buying you pay but don't really get the product.

                            Posted at 11/18/2007-11:51:47 PM by Navigator, Reviewer , View profile [ Reputation score: 1 / 9 ]

                              Rating: Bad shopping experience

                              I signed up for their ErrorSmart software. The bank took my payment but no authorisation code has been received.

                              Posted at 11/14/2007-02:45:24 AM by alanrclarke, Reviewer , View profile [ Reputation score: 1 / 9 ]

                                Rating: Adware, spyware, or viruses

                                its like a rouge antispyware

                                Posted at 11/04/2007-03:49:22 PM by ANoobishAV, Reviewer , View profile [ Reputation score: 0 / 9 ]


                                  In a previous review, I pointed out several examples of deceptive sales and business tactics that are used by the people that run this site, including:

                                  • A history of exploiting the names of legitimate anti-spyware programs
                                  • Unsubstantiated claims like "award-winning"
                                  • A total lack of credible contact information
                                  • Promotion of the same software on numerous clone sites
                                  • Encouraging affiliates to relentlessly promote the software, resulting in numerous bogus "review" web sites

                                  Ben Edelman recently discovered that these people are STILL exploiting the names of legitimate anti-spyware programs. In his reviews of antispyware.com, spywarebot.com and tune-pc.com, he said:

                                  "Misleading Google ads falsely describe this product as 'Microsoft AntiSpyware' when in fact it comes from an independent third party."

                                  http://www.siteadvisor.com/sites/antispyware.com/postid/?p=509409#post509409

                                  Posted at 10/08/2007-05:19:45 PM by dean, Experienced Reviewer , View profile [ Reputation score: 9 / 9 ]

                                    Rating: Bad shopping experience

                                    The people that run this site bill themselves as, well I don't really know. I do know that they run a smorgasbord of sites which include the following:

                                    adwarealert.com
                                    antispyware.com
                                    errorkiller.com
                                    errorsmart.com
                                    evidenceeraser.com
                                    macrovirus.com
                                    malwarebot.com
                                    regclean.com
                                    registrybot.com
                                    registrysmart.com
                                    regsweep.com
                                    restore-pc.com
                                    spywarebot.com
                                    spywareremover.com

                                    They have a sketchy past which includes having AdwareAlert listed on Spywarewarrior's list of rogues. Subsequently, it was removed.

                                    http://spywarewarrior.com/rogue_anti-spyware.htm#adw-alert_note

                                    Another one of their programs, SpywareBot (spywarebot.com) continues to be listed as a rogue because it exploits the name of another anti-spyware program, Spybot Search & Destroy. According to Spywarewarrior, AdwareAlert and SpywareBot are the same program.

                                    Many vendors these days operate in a grey area. Their products are not trojans nor are they considered to be first-tier products in their field. Instead of focusing their efforts on software development, instead they choose to focus on affiliate marketing. This is the path that the people behind these sites have chosen. If you click on the affiliate link on any of these sites, you will find various promos that include statements like "Join Our Affiliate Program And Earn 75% Profit!"

                                    Contact information (or the lack of same) is another method the potential buyer can use to separate real developers from mere promoters. On the sites mentioned above, you won't find any meaningful contact information. No postal address. No phone numbers. No names of any person. Their sites are registered through Domains by Proxy. Does this sound anything like what legitimate businesses do?

                                    On one of their sites (macrovirus.com), they claim that "MacroVirus is the Award-Winning Total Security Solution." Oh really? If you do a search on the web sites of AV-Comparatives (av-comparatives.org) and Virus Bulletin (virusbtn.com), you won't find any mention of the software sold at macrovirus.com.

                                    If MacroVirus was a legitimate anti-virus program, they would be participating in at least one of these programs, as most true industry leaders do. Other promotional statements like "world's leading privacy protection software company" appear on their other sites as well.

                                    All payments are processed through ClickBank. Nothing more needs to be said about that. They liberally advertise "free scan" or "free download" but you soon find out that it isn't possible to do anything meaningful with the program until it is registered.

                                    Finally, can anyone here tell me about a legitimate product they have bought where 75% of the purchase price went to the sales person? There are recognized products from industry leaders that post real contact information on their sites and do not have, or need, affiliates relentlessly promoting their products. Furthermore, these products cost about the same as you would pay at one of the above sites. All of this is very likely to add up to a Bad Shopping Experience. The choice is yours to make.

                                    Posted at 08/11/2007-02:26:13 AM by dean, Experienced Reviewer , View profile [ Reputation score: 9 / 9 ]

                                      page 1 of 1

                                       
                                      Mike
                                      XPS720
                                      Windows Vista Ultimate
                                      McAfee Security Center
                                      Microsoft Office 2007
                                      Intel® Core™2 Quad Q6600 2.40 GHz 1066 MHz
                                      4Gb Crucial DDR2 PC2-6400DDR2-800 SLI-Ready
                                      Qty.(1) Seagate Barracuda 250Gb Hard Drive
                                      Qty.(2) Seagate Barracuda 500Gb Hard Drive
                                      nVidia GeForce 8800 GTX 786Mb Memory
                                      Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Sound Card
                                      Liteon 16X DVD-ROM
                                      Liteon 16X DVD-RW
                                      Broadcom 5754 Ethernet NIC NetXtreme
                                      Dell 24" LCD Monitor
                                      Logitec Cordless Desktop Wave Keyboard & Mouse
                                      HP Scanjet G4010 Photo Flatbed Scanner
                                      Canon i950s Photo Printer


                                      Message Edited by LeahcimAz on 01-14-2008 11:13 AM

                                      Message Edited by LeahcimAz on 01-14-2008 11:13 AM

                                      65 Posts

                                      January 14th, 2008 18:00

                                      Sara - what I do is every couple of weeks I delete history and temporary internet files.  This gets the biggest boost in performance by getting rid of the most trash.
                                       
                                      Then, less frequently, I manually delete cookies for sites that don't need to remember my ID.  (After deleting temp net files, you can see your cookies by clicking the browsing history "settings" button and then "view files".)

                                      227 Posts

                                      January 14th, 2008 18:00

                                      So going back to my question about cookies, let's  say I have put something on Amazon in my "wish list." OK. I delete all my cookies. Now I go back to Amazon. If I put in my user name and password, will my wish list still be there? 
                                       
                                      I am looking at the pros and cons of deleting cookies.
                                       
                                      Sara408

                                      54 Posts

                                      January 14th, 2008 18:00

                                      Lupercalh,
                                       
                                      I absolutely agree, Ccleaner is the best thing since sliced bread and FREE.:smileywink: The first link you gave was a good link, BUT there are TWO download buttons, one good that says "download Ccleaner now" and one bad:smileymad:.
                                       
                                      If you use the cookie option under "options" - "cookies" you can always keep the wanted cookies with passwords etc. Then the main function deletes the un-needed cookies. I run this about every two days or so.
                                       
                                      The registry portion is very very powerful and useful, but MUST be used with some caution and some knowledge.
                                       
                                      GREAT tip Lupercalh
                                       
                                      Robert

                                      306 Posts

                                      January 14th, 2008 18:00

                                      HI Sara,
                                       
                                      Yes it would be, that information is controled by your User Name and Password and is on Amazon's server not you computer.
                                       
                                      Mike
                                      XPS720
                                      Windows Vista Ultimate
                                      McAfee Security Center
                                      Microsoft Office 2007
                                      Intel® Core™2 Quad Q6600 2.40 GHz 1066 MHz
                                      4Gb Crucial DDR2 PC2-6400DDR2-800 SLI-Ready
                                      Qty.(1) Seagate Barracuda 250Gb Hard Drive
                                      Qty.(2) Seagate Barracuda 500Gb Hard Drive
                                      nVidia GeForce 8800 GTX 786Mb Memory
                                      Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Sound Card
                                      Liteon 16X DVD-ROM
                                      Liteon 16X DVD-RW
                                      Broadcom 5754 Ethernet NIC NetXtreme
                                      Dell 24" LCD Monitor
                                      Logitec Cordless Desktop Wave Keyboard & Mouse
                                      HP Scanjet G4010 Photo Flatbed Scanner
                                      Canon i950s Photo Printer


                                      Message Edited by LeahcimAz on 01-14-2008 12:24 PM

                                      January 15th, 2008 22:00

                                      my suggestion is to download firefox ( www.firefox.com ) and everytime you quit firefox you can delete your junk. i would recommend this but of course it is up to you in the end...

                                      322 Posts

                                      January 16th, 2008 00:00

                                      There is no problem with the site that has CCleaner on it.  The problem is you are clicking on one of those big orange icons instead of the small CCleaner icon toward the top of the page.  You just have to look for it.  I have been  using it for over a year on XP and Vista ultimate without a hitch.  It tells you just what it is going to delete.  99% of the stuff that it deletes are temp files of one sort or another.  As far as I know it never hurts to delete temp files.  I have used the included reg editor program once without a problem on my 720 with Vista Ultimate.  Of course then I read here a number of times it could be dangerous.  I did back up my reg file before doing it and kept it for a couple weeks just to be safe.
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