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Understanding Internet risks
Risks to your privacy
You may want to prevent some users from sending private information over the Internet. Norton Personal Firewall can block users from accessing secure sites where they might be asked for personal information.
Understanding cookies
Cookies are messages sent to your browser by Web sites that are stored as small files on your computer. They are often used by Web sites to track your visits. In most cases, cookies do not contain personal information, but instead carry information that identifies you to Web sites.
Good cookies
In their most benign form, cookies last only until you close your browser. This type of cookie is mainly used to remember choices that you make as you navigate through a Web site.
Many sites leave cookies on your computer so that they recognize you when you return to their sites. These cookies identify you so that options that you have chosen in the past are used for your current visit to the site. If you frequent a site that remembers the stocks that you want to track, for example, it probably uses this kind of cookie.
Bad cookies
In one of their malevolent forms, cookies from one Web site might track your visits to a different Web site. For example, most of the ads that you see on Web sites do not come from the site that you are viewing, but from sites that provide ads to many sites. When the advertising site displays the ad, it can access cookies on your computer. This lets the advertising company track your Web usage over a range of sites and profile your browsing habits.
Blocking cookies
Norton Personal Firewall can block all cookies or it can notify you of each cookie request. If you block all cookies, you lose functionality at many Web sites. For example, you might be blocked from making purchases at some Internet stores. If you choose to be prompted each time that a Web site tries to create a cookie, you can evaluate each request and block those that are not from the site that you are viewing. Norton Personal Firewall can block or allow cookies from particular domains or Web sites.
