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"Burnt Cookies" works in conjunction with Microsoft's Internet Explorer (3.02 or later) This includes IE 6, especially if the IE Privacy slider is set to Low when Burnt Cookies extra control over Cookies shines through. Burnt Cookies puts you back in control of the information stored on your computer.
If you have already decided to give it a try then please go to the Download page.
When you browse the web then the web-site that provides the content you are looking at can write a small packet of data, called a cookie, to your hard-disk. The browser makes sure that only the web-site that wrote the cookie can read the cookie. This can be genuinely useful as it allows the web-site to store information which you might otherwise have to type in every time you logged on to that site.
Many pages that you view on the web contain content that comes from web-sites other than the one that appears on your browser's address bar. Typically, such content is provided by advertisers. If you examine the definition of a Cookie given above you will realize that each of these advertisers can also place a cookie on your computer. What is not so obvious is that when the advertiser receives a request to place an advert on the web-page you are viewing then the name of that page is also passed along with the request.
The result is that a third party (the advertiser) can track all of the
sites that
you visit as long as those sites contain content provided by that advertiser!
It is quite possible that detailed personal information collected
about you by a web-site can be passed on to these third parties. You only need to forget
to uncheck that unobtrusive check-box on a form stating that you agree that your details
can be released to third parties just once and the genie is out of the bottle!
As a result any anonymity is lost. Third parties can track many of the
web-sites you visit and at the same time can know your name, address, marital status... -
need I say more.
To be fair, while web-profiling is common it is not yet obvious that
many advertisers are also associating web-page hits with your name and address. However,
we all know that if it can be done it will be done - it is just a matter of time.
You can disable all cookies using your browser's configuration options or you can ask your browser to confirm acceptance of each new cookie. The first solution works but it also breaks a lot of web-sites which legitimately use cookies to enhance their content. The second solution can be a real pain because so many cookies are sent that you are always having to accept or reject them.
Under IE6 you have more control over the sort of Cookies the browser
lets through but Burnt Cookies can give you an even finer level of control by working on a
site by site basis.
Download and Install "Burnt
Cookies"! It will track all changes to your cookie folder and, provided you set
the right options, it can prompt you only if it thinks you have received a cookie from a
third party (i.e. not from the web-site address you have requested). It will also silently
delete any cookies you have added to your "Burn List" and allows you to view the
contents of cookies already on your system and delete those as well.
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