Harbor Freight Cookie - cannot delete!

So far, it seems to be working! Yea!!!

I really want to thank everybody for their support.

Dominic23: That was a really great first post. Excellent. Really liked the annotated screen shots (especially the green “grey” area - how did you do that?). Couldn’t get the “Helpful” tab to work on the first post but at least it worked on the next one.

Eric Root: Those links really explained things and were really helpful. Really like the later post with the list of all the places that Evercookie can be lurking.

tygb: Your final post solution worked for me. The wording was a little scary because I was never sure which Library was supposed to be deleted and the thought of deleting it as written, with all those folders and files, well, …. but at this point I was so frustrated with that damm cookie I took a leap and did it.

Like you said, things re-created themselves and so far, knock on wood, that cookie hasn’t showed up yet so this appears to have worked.

Solving this problem has shown that there are a number of other nefarious cookies tracking and collecting stuff, and taking up space on my drive, not to mention slowing it down. I paid for the computer and pay the Internet bill, they have no right (in my opinion) to be messing with my stuff.

Again, thanks everybody and I hope this helps others.

The post you wrote about iCloud , bookmarks, test using a new user account, "pulling history from other devices", etc. was a good one. I hadn't thought that far ahead but, geeze, does it ever end? There can be too much interconnection and then it becomes hard to keep track of everything.

Eric, you got another good one:

"Not what you wanted to read, but......

If that website is in Top Sites or Favorites, it will auto reload when those are refreshed."

True, it wasn't what I wanted to hear, but, unfortunately, it was what I needed to hear. Thanks for coming back and posting it.

Dominic - that was a really helpful post and an interesting observation:

"From my experience it seems that if a user empties caches (Develop menu) and delete other data twice,

the removal sticks."

You might be onto something there. I noticed after deleting the files that when I went back to web pages there seemed to be more stuff stored than usual but without doing a scientific replication I can't be sure.

There is sooo much to know ..... and remember ....

Why do browsers and operating systems make it so easy for others to put stuff on our computer? Isn't it easy for the code writers to prevent a lot of that?

Now if I can keep Google and YouTube outa my computer! Oh, and let's not forget Adobe. If one has Flash installed this is a good link to check for more data mining stuff:

http://www.macromedia.com/support/documentation/en/flashplayer/help/settings_man ager07.html

Thanks for coming back with more detailed information.

Drew, to answer your question:

"To be clear, do you have 'Safari' checked in those iCloud settings?"

Actually, I don't. And thanks to your earlier comments I doubt I ever will !

Seems like doing that could open a can of worms or Pandora's box. It's bad enough as it is trying to keep everything clean and running smoothly.

It's no wonder that when getting a new computer, or one that has a new install, that it runs so smooth and fast.

-= EPILOG =-

To anyone reading this thread please realize that every contributor provided valuable information that ultimately lead to the solution.

There is an earlier post that I wrote thanking contributors for various items but what made it happen was tygb’s comment at the bottom of Page 1:

"You wrote in point no 3 , yes I also referred to user library , click on finder > Go > hold option key > Library > you will enter in user library and you can delete the entire contents of safari folder"

While it wasn’t totally clear which Library, and what contents, I took a gamble and it worked. It was scary because I didn’t know if the application would be corrupted or if other problems would occur: however, as of a day later, so far it seems to have worked.

Like a director getting an award at the Oscars, I want to thank everyone who contributed. Oh, lets not forget, to UN-thank Harbor Freight for their virus-like cookie!

Other firms using Evercookies need to be equally publicized.

Hey guys, even though I've done fairly good at using video and animation applications, I'm having a really difficult time dealing with this Apple Community style board, namely the buttons for Helpful and This solved my problem. I wanted to show that my problem is solved and selected a post to indicate that but wound up getting the wrong post selected, perhaps because it was in memory?, who knows (what evil lurks) within a computer's memory.

Anyway, I'm really embarrassed that it was one of my posts that got selected as having "solved" my problem and I can't un-do it, can't edit it, can't change it. Even went so far as to contact Apple Support and after a lengthy time of going over the issue ended up with "there's nothing that can be done." The suggestion was to write a new post explaining the situation and this is it. So, ..... for anyone following this, there is a huge amount of very useful information but my "solved" post isn't one of them.

The best step-by-step procedure is probably the post by tygb that was just before my "solved" post. Although, everyone else post really added to the understanding and everybody did a marvelous job of helping to deal with the issue.

Hopefully, anyone following in my footsteps will read and take in with greater understanding what all you knowledgeable supports have contributed. For me, this was a real learning experience.

Apple did send me an email with a survey that I filled out and hopefully someone will read it and make some changes to improve this board.

Thanks again guys.

tygb: You, sir, are a very brave guy.

Just saw your post after I posted mine so I'll give it a try. Sure looks promising.

Think this will work with Google too??? (ha ha)