Cookies are simply text files sent by a Web site to your computer to track your movements within its pages. They're something like virtual license plates, assigned to your browser so a site can spot you in a sea of millions of visitors. Cookies remember your login and password, the products you've just bought, or your preferred color scheme. Sites that ask you to register use cookies to target advertising—someone who claims an annual salary of $35,000 might see ads for Boca Burgers rather than foie gras. Though cookies make navigating the Web profoundly easier, those who deploy them have done a lousy job at promoting their utility. The result is that lots of people don't trust them. Many surfers erase cookies frequently or refuse them entirely, blaming them for everything from spying, to identity theft, to slow Internet connections. A slew of security products lump them in with spyware, viruses, and other nasties and promise to snuff them out at no extra charge. Cookies are not software. They can't be programmed, can't carry viruses, and can't unleash malware to go wilding through your hard drive. Only the Web site that sent you the cookie can read it. As soon as you leave a site, its cookie sits dormant, waiting for your return The exceptions are third-party cookies—also known as "tracking cookies"—placed by an entity (usually a marketing or advertising company) that's interested in tagging visitors. Often they make sure a user won't be hit with the same ad twice; others guarantee that someone who says they have an interest in sports gets different ads than someone who likes gadgets. But third-party cookies could also be used to compile a dossier of surfing habits. Say you visit a Web site with cookies served by a marketing company like DoubleClick. The cookie it dispatches will come alive every time you visit another site that does business with DoubleClick. That means it could track you over dozens of sites, logging every article you read, every ad you click on, and every gadget and gizmo you buy without your knowledge or approval What makes many people uneasy is the potential for DoubleClick or a similar firm to match a user's e-mail, home address, and phone number to his surfing history. How do we know the company won't use this information for purposes other than advertising and marketing? All we have is its word that it won't "attempt to know the real-world identity of the owner or user of a computer's browser." DoubleClick was pummeled six years ago when it announced its intent to create a database of consumer profiles that would include names, addresses, and online purchase histories. After public outcry and a class-action suit (which was settled in 2002), DoubleClick did an about-face and said it had made a huge mistake The Web often feels like a free medium, where you can read anything you want free of charge. What keeps it cheap and convenient, though, is that it's an advertisers' medium. At the same time that ad revenue allows companies to serve content free of charge, consumers have unprecedented control over how they consume ad content, both online and offline. Just like you can TiVo shows and skip the commercials, you can block pop-up ads, filter junk e-mail, and corral cookies. Every major browser (Internet Explorer, Safari, and Mozilla Firefox) lets you customize your cookie consumption to accept them from sites you trust, reject them from parties you don't, or block them entirely. And this web site will help set your cookie settings: http://www.heapmedia.com/privacy/cookies/ you do need them as the article tells you above but you can decide how tight to set you privacy & cookies.

indentity theft

A message given to a Web browser by a Web server. The browser stores the message in a text file. The message is then sent back to the server each time the browser requests a page from the server. Also see session cookie and persistent cookie. The main purpose of cookies is to identify users and possibly prepare customized Web pages for them. When you enter a Web site using cookies, you may be asked to fill out a form providing such information as your name and interests. This information is packaged into a cookie and sent to your Web browser which stores it for later use. The next time you go to the same Web site, your browser will send the cookie to the Web server. The server can use this information to present you with custom Web pages. So, for example, instead of seeing just a generic welcome page you might see a welcome page with your name on it.

A data file written to a hard drive by some Web sites, contains information the site can use to track such things as passwords, login, registration or identification, user preferences, online shopping cart information, and lists of pages visited. Hopefully i helped you.

an inedible cookie that doesnt have much part of my life.

A handle, transaction ID, or other token of agreement between cooperating programs. “I give him a packet, he gives me back a cookie.” The claim check you get from a dry-cleaning shop is a perfect mundane example of a cookie; the only thing it's useful for is to relate a later transaction to this one (so you get the same clothes back). Syn. magic cookie; see also fortune cookie. Now mainstream in the specific sense of web-browser cookies. Hopefully it helps you out.

All Web sites, with a little exception store information in small text files on your PC. These files are called cookies. Cookies are actually privacy threat because they can contain sensitive information like your name and password for web mailboxes, password-protected sites, etc. I saw this info here: http://www.milincorporated.com/a_cookies.html and btw I clean my cookies with Mil Shield, my privacy shield

A cookie is a small piece of text stored on a user's computer by a web browser. A cookie consists of one or more name-value pairs containing bits of information such as user preferences, shopping cart contents, the identifier for a server-based session, or other data used by websites.

In computing, a cookie (also tracking cookie, browser cookie, and HTTP cookie) is a small piece of text stored on a user's computer by a web browser. A cookie consists of one or more name-value pairs containing bits of information such as user preferences, shopping cart contents, the identifier for a server-based session, or other data used by websites

because you can ask for the browser for a cook