Visit Sites Bearing the eTrust Symbol To make sure the information a user provides online voluntarily does not come back to haunt him, he should look for the eTrust symbol that will soon be turning up on Web sites. Just Say No to Cookies Web browsers can be set to warn a user whenever a site attempts to place a cookie on the computer's hard drive. In Internet Explorer versions 2.0 and later, go to the View menu, select Options, click on the Advanced tab and then check the box that says Warn Before Accepting Cookies. In Netscape Navigator versions 1.0 and above, go to the Options menu, select Network Preferences, click on the Protocols tab, then check the box that says Show an Alert Before Accepting a Cookie. This site acts as a middleman between a user's PC and the Web so that when she types in a URL or clicks on a hyperlink, the Anonymizer retrieves the Web page for her without revealing her identity and without allowing any cookies to be deposited on her computer.
Additional help is on the horizon.
Until such an act is in place, however, Eckhouse recommends parents take an active role in monitoring their children's activities while they are online. Additionally, consumers would have the right to see and correct errors in any personal information stored online by the company. Copyright 1997 PR Newswire. All rights reserved Infowar.