Interesting commentary on Google

[McKenzie]

I keep a close eye on security and privacy issues on the net. Google became the focus of intense debate a while back due to the persistent cookies it planted; the newsgroups were full of it.

For what it's worth I'd advise disabling cookies unless sites need you to carry one for authentication purposes. They are not functionally necessary.

<snip>

Google was the first search engine to use a cookie that expires in 2038. This was at a time when federal websites were prohibited from using persistent cookies altogether. Now it's years later, and immortal cookies are commonplace among search engines; Google set the standard because no one bothered to challenge them. This cookie places a unique ID number on your hard disk. Anytime you land on a Google page, you get a Google cookie if you don't already have one. If you have one, they read and record your unique ID number.

<snip>

http://www.google-watch.org/bigbro.html

main page>>>

http://www.google-watch.org/

[bemildred]

1. I like to delete them periodically. nt

But then you have to remember your passwords etc. at various sites,
like DU.

[salvorhardin]

2. Firefox allows

you to manage your cookies on a site-by-site basis (via exceptions which always allow or always deny). So, it's possible to deny cookies to google or doubleclick altogether while allowing other sites to set cookies. Also, it's useful to set Firefox to accept cookies for originating sites only.

[bemildred]

3. Yeah, I run Mozilla, but I'm too lazy most of the time to do that.

It is a nice feature, but I need to upgrade to bemildred 2.0.

[Berserker]

4. Or if a person insists on

using IE. Then you can install CookieWall. It's a free program and works great!
http://www.analogx.com/contents/download/network/cookie.htm?
A little more about cookies here (bastard biscuits)
http://www.jdrn.com/nacl/

[Wiley50]

5. What's the best free, alternative search engine? n/t

[Berserker]

6. I have been using

Clusty
as a back up to Google