# How to delete the cookie that remembers what you've searched?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-delete-the-cookie-that-remembers-what-youve-searched/160956>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [March 12, 2003, 10:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-delete-the-cookie-that-remembers-what-youve-searched/160956 "2003-03-12T22:35:17Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![PunditLisa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/4af34b/32.png) [@PunditLisa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PunditLisa)\
**Post date:** [March 12, 2003, 10:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-delete-the-cookie-that-remembers-what-youve-searched/160956/1 "2003-03-12T22:35:17Z")

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My husband goes to Google something the other day and he typed in the letter “A.” Up popped an oh-so-helpful list of things we had searched before, including the name of a former boyfriend of mine. He said teasingly, "Why were you searching for “Andrew xx?”

I turned ten shades of red because I indeed had googled his name. It was all innocent as these things go because Andy is a police officer here in town and was shot 2 years ago in the riots. I had googled his name to e-mail the story to a friend of mine who knew Andy. Of course, that was TWO years ago! I never dreamed my browser would keep that in its cache forever.

Since I’ve been known to search a potentially embarrassing name here or there (just out of curiosity, I swear!), how can I clear this out of the browser’s memory so I can avoid further incriminations?

Thx!

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**Author:** ![Q.E.D](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/51bf81/32.png) [@Q.E.D](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.E.D)\
**Post date:** [March 12, 2003, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-delete-the-cookie-that-remembers-what-youve-searched/160956/2 "2003-03-12T22:38:36Z")

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It isn’t a cookie. You want to turn off a feature called “inline autocomplete”. Assuming you are using IE, you click Tools \> Internet Options \> Content Tab. You can change the options for this there.

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**Author:** ![Q.E.D](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/51bf81/32.png) [@Q.E.D](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.E.D)\
**Post date:** [March 12, 2003, 10:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-delete-the-cookie-that-remembers-what-youve-searched/160956/3 "2003-03-12T22:43:31Z")

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I almost forgot, you can also delete individual items from that list without turning autocomplete off. All you do is scroll through the list when it drops down, highlight the item you want to remove by hovering the cursor over it, and hit the Delete key.

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**Author:** ![PunditLisa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/4af34b/32.png) [@PunditLisa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PunditLisa)\
**Post date:** [March 13, 2003, 1:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-delete-the-cookie-that-remembers-what-youve-searched/160956/4 "2003-03-13T13:23:58Z")

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Q.E.D., thanks a million for the tip!

L-

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**Author:** ![EasyPhil](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e47c2d/32.png) [@EasyPhil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EasyPhil)\
**Post date:** [March 13, 2003, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-delete-the-cookie-that-remembers-what-youve-searched/160956/5 "2003-03-13T14:51:24Z")

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You can also leave the auto complete on and go to Tools-Internet Options-General tab and clear the history of the web pages visited.