Microsoft Office Technical Support

Configuring Privacy Settings in IE

Friday, September 4, 2009

The Privacy tab of the Internet Options dialog box allows you to control how Internet Explorer handles cookies, which are small text files stored on your computer by websites. Websites use cookies to store user preferences for personalized sites, and cookies often contain personal information used to identify the user to the website. Although most cookies are legitimate, some are not. Unsatisfactory cookies are those that are used to provide personally identifiable information for a secondary purpose, such as selling your e-mail address to third-party vendors, or sharing your name and address with other companies. Because there are unsatisfactory cookies, it is important to understand the different types of cookies, how to delete cookies, and how to change privacy settings to prevent different types of cookies from being saved to the computer.

Your company might require that changes be made to the default settings for cookies, too, so you need to know how to make changes if asked. Cookies can be either persistent (they remain after Internet Explorer is closed and can be reused) or temporary (they are deleted when Internet Explorer is closed). Also, there are first-party and third-party cookies. First-party cookies originate from the website that you are currently viewing. Third-party cookies originate from a site different from the one that you are currently viewing but are somehow related to the current website. For example, many sites use advertising from third-party sites, and those sites commonly use cookies to track your website usage for advertising purposes.

Block All Cookies Blocks new cookies from being created and prevents access to existing cookies. If per-site privacy settings are configured, they do not override this setting.

High Blocks all cookies that use personal information without the user’s explicit consent. If per-site privacy settings are configured, they override this setting in windows xp.

Medium High Blocks all third-party cookies that do not have a compact privacy policy or that use personal information without the user’s explicit consent, and all first-party cookies that use personal information without implicit consent. If per-site privacy settings are configured, they override this setting.

Medium Blocks all third-party cookies that do not have a compact privacy policy or that use personal information without the user’s explicit consent. First-party cookies that use personal information without implicit consent are allowed, but they are deleted when the browser is closed. Access to first-party cookies is restricted to first-party context if the cookie does not have a compact privacy policy. If per-site privacy settings are configured, they override this setting.

Low Permits websites to store all cookies on the computer. When the browser is closed, third-party cookies are deleted. Access to first-party cookies is restricted to first-party context if the cookie does not have a compact privacy policy. If per-site privacy settings are configured, they override this setting.

Accept All Cookies Enables all websites to store and access cookies on the computer. If per-site privacy settings are configured, they do not override this setting.


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