One of the computer technologies that have revolutionized web surfing are cookies. Cookies are extremely small pieces of information that are stored on your computer. Web cookies serve a few purposes, mainly cookies are able to customize your web experience when you visit a specific web site that you possess a cookie for. Here is some more information.
What`s a Cookie ?
Cookies are extremely small pieces of information usually only a few bytes in size (usually no longer than 255 characters).They are usually downloaded by the user when they visit a site that offers cookies. Cookies make it easy to customize a site. For instance, if you visit a news site that requires members to register & log in, a cookie can tell the news web site web server that you are already a registered member & that you no longer need to log in, meaning, you can easily access the site without any additional steps. Cookies are also used to track users web habits once on a site.
For instance, a web server can usually tell which pages a specific user is interested in with the use of cookies. If you are tracking a package, you can easily return to a delivery site and pull up current information on your package without resubmitting information. There are plenty of ways that cookies can help a computer user be more effective on a specific web site.
What a Cookie is NOT
Cookies are not viruses, spyware, adware, or malware; they are extremely small programs that can only be read by the web server that has issued the cookie. While a cookie can track you once on its web site, it can not use other cookies that are on your computer.
It is important to note that cookies can not steal your personal information. A cookie can usually help the web server identify the visitor & match up the cookie to an IP address of your computer, the name of your computer, the browser that you are using, the operating system that you are using & the current URL page & previous URL page you have accessed, beyond that you are anonymous.
Unfortunately, cookies have a bad reputation. They were originally created for the good of the web surfer. A cookie is supposed to make your web surfing experience much more efficient by easily telling the web site which has a cookie for you which settings you prefer and give you the ability to log into sites with ease. However because of the intuitive nature of the cookie, advertisers have used the cookie creating possible privacy issues for many users.
Advertising uses the cookie extensively. Because a cookie is able to record the habits of a visitor on a specific web site, advertisers like to know as much as possible about specific visitors and their on-site behavior. Collecting this information is easy with the help of cookies. While your name & personal information is anonymous, your computer name & your surfing habits on a specific site using a cookie are not. A web site can cultivate information about a single user & then market specific products & advertisements to these visitors the next they visit the site.
For instance, let's say that you own a sports web site that caters to basketball, baseball & football. One visitor with the computer name John, visits the site each day, but only visits the web pages associated with baseball products, knowing this information the web site owner can serve up ads & products only dealing with baseball products & services.
Because a cookie can track your on site web surfing habits, this can lead to privacy issues for certain users. Web browsers & computer companies have come up with ways to deal with these issues.
You can ask your web browser to notify you anytime you visit a web site & the web site wants to create a cookie for you. This way you are informed of which sites use cookies & can deny a cookie or accept it. Please note that some sites will not allow you to visit their site without a cookie.
The other way to control cookies is to delete a cookie after visiting the site. Since the cookie information is stored server side, by deleting the cookie, the next time you visit the site, the web server will have to create a new cookie for you. You can easily delete your cookies on MS Internet Explorer by going into the Tools menu & click on Internet Options, you will see a button to delete cookies or you can use tools to delete your cookies & logs like CCleaner,which is a freeware programme
& very effective.
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