What is a Computer Cookie - in Plain English

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Introduction to Internet Cookie

What is really a computer cookie? Is cookie a virus? How a cookie is used? Lot of people ask me this question and also many of them have misconception about the cookie. Here is all you need to know about a computer cookie. It is also referred as internet cookie. “Ten Blogger” wants to provide this information in plain english so a cookie can be easily understood by every one. It will be useful for technical as well as non-technical folks.

What is a Computer Cookie or internet cookie or browser cookie?

Computer cookies (also called as internet cookie or browser cookie) are small piece of information in text format that are downloaded to your computer when you visit a Web site. When you visit a website for a very first time, the website sends a cookie to your computer. In subsequent visits it uses the information from the cookie and also it may update the information in the cookie.

Visiting a single Web site can actually result in the downloading of multiple cookies. Cookies typically contain some kind of ID number, a domain that the cookie is valid for, and an expiration date. They may also contain other tracking information such as login names and pages visited. Since they are in text format, they can be read with a regular text editor such as Notepad.

How is a Cookie used by websites?

The purpose of cookie is to tell the web server that you returned to that Web page, when you visit the same website next time.

Example 1: weather.com

I am first time user of weather.com. I go to this site and search for “Los Angeles” weather. Immediately a cookie is created and it is kept in my hard drive with the information that I searched for “Los Angeles” weather.

(Refer images 1 to 5 for this example)

When I visit the weather.com site the next time, it shows that I had recently searched for “Los Angeles”.

So in this case the weather.com was using this cookie information to pre-populate my searches. In other words, it is used to personalize the website information.

Example 2: finance.yahoo.com

When I go to this site and check some stock quotes e.g. ORCL (oracle) , MSFT (Microsoft) , INTC (Intel). It stores that information in the cookies.

So next time when I visit http://finance.yahoo.com , it shows up those Stocks quotes in “Recent Quotes” section. Again, in this case, yahoo is using the cookie to enhance my user experience. (Refer images 6 and 7 for this example)

Cookies are also used to store the login IDs also in some cases passwords to the site. So if you are using a public computer, you should not opt an option to store the password.

If a site has several pages and you go from one to the other the site does not remember which pages you have been to. That is, it won’t unless a cookie is on your machine to remind the site and provide continuity.

A fairly harmless (and perhaps even useful) advertising application of cookies is to rotate banner ads as you go from page to page to make sure that you do not see the same ads over and over.

Scroll down for images.... © Ten Blogger

See all 7 photos

Where can I find the cookies on my computer?

Each type of Internet browser designates a particular place for storing cookies.

Internet Explorer (IE) has a folder Cookies\ where cookies are kept as small individual text files, one for each cookie.

Windows XP has different folders, one for each user, \Documents and Settings\[User name]\Cookies\. (see image 4 for example)

The easiest way to find where cookies are kept is to do a Find or Search either on the folder name "Cookies" or the file name "cookies.txt", depending on your browser.

Is cookie a virus ?

No. Cookie is not a virus. It should be emphasized that cookies are plain text files and, as such, are not executable programs and cannot do anything to your computer.

Can a company read my personal information from my hard disk with a cookie?

No. Only the cookie that is sent in the first place is returned to the server. It is not modified or manipulated in any way.

What is the tracking cookie and what are privacy issues?

Although some cookies provide a useful function, many others may not be desirable. Cookies have been turned into a tracking mechanism used by advertisers. Although, cookies are only accessible to the site that originated them but large advertising agencies with many clients can easily go around this restriction by collecting information for all their clients. For example, advertising application use the cookies to rotate banner ads as you go from page to page to make sure that you do not see the same ads over and over.

However, there are more invasive tracking methods that might involve cookies and there in arise privacy issues. The information that people reveal to each Web site they visit can be used by system administrators to build extensive personal profiles of visitors. By automatically placing a Cookie on visitors' Web browsers, Servers register data on the Cookie. This allows administrators to view the history of site's users has last visited before they enter that site, the advertisements they have viewed and the online transactions they have conducted. Again, sites can only access cookies from their own domain. While Cookies can be useful in some situations (for example, in saving a user's password to a particular site), some people constitute this as invasion of privacy. Remember a web site only knows the data that you have entered.

How to delete or control a cookie on Internet Explorer

First, to delete your existing cookies. Click on Tools > Internet Options ... and then click on the Delete Cookies ... button.
Next, click on the tab marked Privacy then click on the Advanced button. Now check Override automatic cookie handling and check Block for Third-party Cookies. To prevent problems with some sites check Always allow session cookies.

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Comments

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dohn121 says:
4 months ago

Very good Q & A hub. Thank you for teaching me what a cookie really is. But what thing that I must say is that some "cookies" that I received seemed to be, according to my anti-virus program, "harmful" and so had to be removed. Any ideas?

Ten Blogger says:
4 months ago

dohn121 >> there's not an awful lot to be worried about - OK, they let a third party track you're movements within a website (sites that they have ads on for example) but they don't let anyone see what you are doing otherwise and certainly don't allow others access to your files.

Anti-virus software sometimes catch these tracking cookies (because some cookies can slow down the processes a little)... but they are not really virus.

lotuslove19 says:
3 months ago

THANKS FOR SUCH A WONDERFUL INFORMATION I AM SURE IT WOULD HELP MANY PEOPLE WHO REALLY DO NOT KNOW THE IN DEPTH OF SURFING,BUT SOMETIMES WE DO NEED TO ERASE THESE COOKIES AS THEY MAKE COMPUTER PRETTY HEAVY AND MAKE IT RUN SLOW.