I just got this from one of my Yahoogroups…take note of the details if you care about virtual spying…
IMPORTANT NOTICE TO ALL YAHOO USERS!!!
If you belong to ANY Yahoo services - be aware that Yahoo is now using “Web Beacons” to track every Yahoo User. It allows Yahoo to record every single website and every single group and every single page that you visit, even when you’re NOT connected to Yahoo.
Go to the link below to opt out of their snooping!
About half-way down the page, find a little “Click Here to Opt Out” link that will let you “opt-out” of their snooping. After you click it be careful NOT to click on the next button shown. It is an “Opt Back In” button that, if clicked, will UNDO the opt-out.
Note that Yahoo’s invasion of your privacy - and your ability to opt-out of it - is not user-specific. It is MACHINE specific. That means you will have to opt-out on every computer (and browser) you use.
Please forward this to anyone you know that may use Yahoo. (especially Yahoo Groups!) You have a right not to be spied on every time you are at your computer!
Yahoo’s beacons are old news, actually. Another term that pops up (heh) now and then for these is “supercookie”
Just follow the procedures listed in the OP’s link to opt out on every computer you use and all’s well. The machine-specific nature of the opt-out requirements makes me think that they truly aren’t looking at your browsing specifically.
Don’t dump all your cookies, or yes, you will have to opt-out over and over again.
FWIW, I’ll look at my cookies every few months, and generally dump whatever didn’t come from places I do business with (eBay, Amazon, SDMB, etc) as those are helpful cookies that hold login IDs or perpetual logins.
It’s the ones from places like ads.cnn.com, tribalfusion, adsense, etc that get dumped.
I don’t agree with the platitude that only criminals have nothing to hide (and that therefore this is nothing to care about), na dI don’t like this particularly. On the other hand, since my ISP already keeps records of everything I see, and my employer’s firewall is logging all of my surfing from there, and every search engine I use could potentially record my searches and IP address, I’m not too worried about Yahoo as well.
Likewise, plus I use Window Washer to remove and bleach over all cookies on my harddrive nightly. I do protect a bunch of cookies to keep information I want, such as my SDMB login.
If you’ve got IE6, you don’t even need an extra application. Head over to Tools, Properties, Privacy tab, Sites… and enter sites that you want to block cookies from.
Might be a bit of work, but if you’re on a corporate PC and can’t install anything, this is a good option.