Deleting Cookies

Hi,

Not possible to delete cookies permanently.

You can have more control by clicking Safari from your menu bar then click Preferences. Select the Security tab.

Select: Only from sites I visit













Carolyn 🙂

😀 no eh

I keep forgetting Onyx has that feature.

In Safari... click Safari / Preferences then select the Security tab. Click: Show Cookies

You can delete individual or all.







🙂

That's why I said you could delete all or individually.







🙂

Quit Safari.

Open a Finder window then select your Home folder in the Sidebar on the left. Then open the Library folder then the Cookies folder.

Move the Cookies.plist file from the Cookies folder to the Trash.

Relaunch Safari.








🙂

As for automatic deletion of cookies: no, Safari does not do that. This means in practise that you have to click on Show Cookies and manually delete those you do not want retained. You obviously want to keep the ones for regularly visited sites (like Apple) to speed up log-in etc.

I have Cookie Preferences set to 'Accept cookies only for sites I visit', but I only wish to retain cookies for the sites i regularly visit, like these forums and others.

To that end I use a small app called SafariCookies:

http://sweetpproductions.com/safaricookies/

which only works on Leopard and Snow Leopard. This adds an item in Safari Preferences whereby you can automatically delete all cookies on shutdown, except those particular 'favourite' ones you wish to retain to avoid entering your user name and password each time you visit.

And it's free!

Don't forget about Flash cookies:


From this website:

http://machacks.tv/2009/01/27/flushapp-flash-cookie-removal-tool-for-os-x/

For those who do not know about Flash cookies, more properly referred to as Local Shared Objects (LSO), they operate in a similar way to regular browser cookies but are stored outside the purview of your browser, meaning you cannot delete them from within your browser, whether Safari, Firefox, Opera or any other. Typically they are issued from sites or 3rd party sites that contain Adobe Flash content. Since virtually all internet advertising is delivered in Flash, Google/Doudleclick and all other internet advertising companies are sure to be tracking your browsing behavior with Flash cookies. These companies can see you traverse the Internet as you come upon the plethora of sites that contain their embedded advertising. Check out the Wikipedia entry here.

In Mac OS X they are stored in the following location:
/User’s Home Folder/Library/Preferences/Macromedia/Flash Player/#SharedObjects

The settings for the Flash cookies are stored in:
/User’s Home Folder/Library/Preferences/Macromedia/Flash Player/macromedia.com/support/flashplayer/sys

In OS X Local Shared Objects, or Flash Cookies, are appended with a .sol suffix. Flush deletes all the Flash cookies (.sol) and their settings.

Flush can be downloaded from that page.

If you want to retain certain Flash cookies but not others, the excellent add-on for Safari called SafariCookies now includes a setting for automatically deleting flash cookies you don't want to retain, when Safari is shut down, in the same as it deals with ordinary cookies:

http://www.sweetpproductions.com/safaricookies/index.htm

which not only does that but much more equally useful stuff!

This article covers the issue in more depth:

http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2009/08/you-deleted-your-cookies-think-again/

Flash cookies are also known as 'Zombie Cookies' and are used by a number of firms, including Hulu, MTV, and Myspace. Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at the internet security firm Sophos, told BBC News that the source of the trouble was Adobe Flash itself, which he called "one of the weirdest programs on the planet".

"I think it's highly unlikely that these large companies have abused Flash cookies - which are different from browser cookies - with malicious intent," he said.

"I think it's much more likely that the vast majority of users are simply oblivious to the bizarre way in which Adobe allows them to configure the software."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-10787882

And a more recent article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/21/technology/21cookie.html?_r=3&scp=1&sq=flash&s t=cse

Did you restart Safari after installing it?