hi ed,
yes, one can selectively save cookies. i just elect to throw them all out.
yes, i visit sites that require passwords and i must reenter same. i personally do not consider it to be an imposition. plus, the password is saved and reused on a 'per session' basis, so if i leave and then return several times throughout the day i don't have to keep reentering the same info.
the main benefit that i derive from daily cookie cleaning (other than the personal satisfaction of knowing that i just rejected something that was essentially forced upon me) is that passwords are not on my hard drive for others to retrieve. in the unfortunate event where someone gains unauthorized access to my machine, they won't have all the passwords. it's my understanding, for example, that when 'back orifice' is successfully installed on a target machine, the bad guy can breeze through victim's files and pull off sensitive data (like passwords) in a matter of minutes. so why make it easy, or better yet, why even leave that possibility open?
clearing cookies does not remove credit card numbers that are already stored with an online vendor. and i believe that one's personal settings at various sites are left unchanged also.
:)
mark |
