Windows 10: Why Cookies in Windws/INETcookies

I just did a full scan with Bitdefender Total Security 2016 and it found and deleted a doubleclick cookie in Users/AppData/Local/Microsoft/Windows/INETcookies. I only use Firefox and manually delete individual cookies from it's cookies.sqlite cache.

I checked the INETcookies folder and there were 32 cookies in it most with fairly recent dates so how if I never use Edge or Internet Explorer could there be recent cookies in that folder ?

One was from Linkedin and I don't remember going anywhere near there on this computer. I've deleted all the cookies in that folder and will check regularly to see if there are any new ones.............. *Huh

:)

 

IE11 normal Cookies are gone since Creators Fall Update

It's amazing guys, how after so many comments (most of which stupid and useless), nobody knows where the cookies are stored.

And please DO NOT answer again mentioning some folder in the file system like InetCache, InetCookies or others.

Cookies are no longer there !!! And that's why we are asking.

 

Documents and Settings: Access Denied: Windows 10

Cookies are located here:

C:\Users\%username%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\INetCookies

But you can clear cookies from IE, that would be the best option.

 

I figured out how Cookies keep getting stored. Microsoft Office will open Edge even though Firefox is the default browser. Even opening Edge for 30 seconds will store a dozen Cookies including DoubleClick and here's the troubling part.......Edge is set to Block All Cookies. *Mad

 

I'm not sure if cookie blocking does what you think it does. It may still store cookies, but block the request of those cookies back to the server that sent them. That would be a perfectly legitimate interpretation, although maybe not what you would expect.

Why would It do that? Imagine you've been using your browser for a bit, and there's a bunch of cookies stored. You turn on cookie blocking, and if it just blocked the storing of the cookies, the existing cookies would still be there and still be sent to the requesting server. Blocking them outgoing would prevent that.

You might argue it should do both, and maybe so.. but it only really needs to do one. A cookie is useless by itself and harmless.

 

Are you just speculating or do you know for sure this is how Edge works ? Blocking should at the very least block the storage of new cookies. As for Cookies being "harmless" I guess that's why security suites like Bitdefender and Webroot delete certain cookies after a scan for malware............*Wink

 

Ok so my Office trial has expired so I stopped using it several days ago. I just checked and there were a dozen cookies stored in INETCookies from yesterday all from the same time. I only use Firefox, I did not open Edge or Internet Explorer so why do these cookies keep reappearing after I delete them ? Is Microsoft forcing them onto our systems ?

 

You may not be using Edge or Internet Explorer but there are Windows components and third party applications that use the browser or some of it's components. It is much simpler to do this than try to work with one of a dozen or more browsers that the user might choose to use. And as Mystere pointed out, blocking cookies does not necessarily do what it might seem.

 

Is not Office 365 free
The cookies you are getting are probably coming from that.
I just ignore them and let Ccleaner remove them every so often
The one you pay for is Office 2016/2013/2007

 

+1 +1

 

No it was an Office 2013 Pro trial version. This issue also happens on two other systems that have never had Office installed nor have never used 365. It happened on another system this morning after deleting all the cookies from INetcookies yesterday. All six cookies that showed up again had the same time stamp. I duplicated the same steps on another computer and also this one I'm on now and the cookies have not yet reappeared. I simply can't duplicate the trigger event that causes the new set of cookies which always include doubleclick. At this point it's more a matter of curiosity as to what is replacing those cookies. On two other systems I've set Internet Explorer to Block All Cookies and on one of them I set Edge to Block. We'll see if either one of them get contaminated again. On this system I have not set either to Block so we'll see if they come back here. All are running Win 10 Pro 64 bit.

 

IE has for quite a while (IE 4?) always created 4 or 5 directories with cookies. I never did figure out why or what IE used them for, but they seemed to be immortal and harmless. Some inner workings of IE when MS was tying the GUI and Browser too tight.

 

I tend to disable inet task, but some inet cookies still popup time to time:

schtasks /Change /TN "Microsoft\Windows\Wininet\CacheTask" /Disable

Caching (Windows)

InternetSetCookie function (Windows)

 

(In response to Slartybart) It depends on what you consider "harmless". If you just use your computer to view photos of the grand kids or to let everyone on Facebook know what you had for dinner then I suppose having your every move tracked is acceptable. I use several of my systems to beta test music production software so it's imperative to me and the developers I work for that those systems are as secure as possible. I also use a couple of other systems for financial analysis and transactions so obviously security is of paramount importance. Like I said there is a reason why security suites such as Bitdefender and Webroot delete cookies like doubleclick when doing a scan for malware. If anyone is also concerned about privacy in Win 10 I've discovered a program called Spybot Anti Beacon which automatically sets all the options available in Win 10 to stop as much tracking and data mining as possible. Anyway as of this time the cookies have not returned on this system. I've also blocked Internet Explorer with Bitdefender's Firewall and so far nothing has complained about not being able to connect.

 

Thank you very much for the information. Do you use Internet Explorer as your default browser ?