Search engines, on the other hand, create a searchable database for information retrieval based on key words submitted by the user. As the Internet has grown, these search engine results are increasingly cluttered with sites marginally related to the key word. Google, a new search engine technology, bases its listing order on how many other pages refer to it, in addition to, the key word match criteria. Page Cookies A cookie is a small data file that is placed on your hard drive when you visit a website. Your browser can be set to either accept or reject cookies.
Cookies allow a web server to keep track of arbitrary information on a user browsing the site.
They are typically used to create a more personalized browsing experience for the user. Cookies are normally set so that only the site the places them, can read them. Properly used, cookies are harmless and useful. Recently, however, both Netscape and Internet Explorer have been shown to be vulnerable to cookies that contain malicious javascript. These malicious cookies can read and transmit private data that is stored on your hard drive.