Cookies have been given a bad reputation, although they are very useful and often not dangerous. A cookie is a text file that is placed on your computer by a web site. You got a cookie when you came here, simply to direct you into the correct part of my web site. The problem with cookies is that people have figured out ways to track our Web surfing with them, and that opens up privacy concerns.

In Internet Explorer it is possible to block cookies by going to Tools and Internet Options. Click on the Privacy tab, and then click on the Advanced button under Settings. You should have something like this:

First Party Cookies are the cookies like the one I gave you - they are from the site you are visiting, and are generally safe. They are most often used to 'remember' us when we return to a site so that we don't have to log in every time. If we block these we will not be able to get into a site that uses cookies, so it is a good idea to allow them.

Third Party Cookies are the cookies that are put on our computers by sites other than the one we are visiting. They often come from an advertisement on the page that we are looking at, but sometimes they come from hidden portions of the page. I prefer to be alerted to these cookies, rather than allow them all of the time. By choosing Prompt in the Privacy Settings, I get a little popup that lets me know every time one of these cookies is being sent to my computer, and I have the option to accept them, block them once, or always accept or block that cookie.

Unless you want to see that popup a lot, I would recommend checking the option Apply my decision to all cookies from this web site before you click on Allow cookie or Block cookie.

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