It appears that a feature of Win95 may enable persistent cookies; and
someone at hotbot appears to have worked out how to exploit the combination
of features.
Any thoughts to me please. Any authoritative answers to link.
I'll pass on to Jose whatever youse blokes come up with.
I expect he'd be pleased for me to pass on his id details to anyone who
wants to correspond directly with him. I *understand* his descriptions,
but I'm not a user of Win95, IE3.02 or even Intel; so I'm of no use
whatsoever, at least technically speaking (:-)}
...
>To: <Roger.Clarke@anu.edu.au>
>Subject: hotbot cookies
>Date: Wed, 1 Oct 1997 12:30:12 -0300
>
>Dear Roger:
>
>I use Windows95 and IE3.02 in a PC486.
>I have IE set not to receive cookies; I daily delete
>caches and history and run antivirus.
>
>Several months ago, when I learnt about the existence of
>cookies, I tried to delete all the cookies I had collected.
>I could delete succesfully all cookies with the exception
>of two cookies named mm256.dat and mm2048.dat
>provenient from Hotbot.
>
>The cookies were in C:\windows\cookies, in all the caches and
>in the history subdirectory. The lates were growing permanently.
>
>Any time I tried to delete them I received the mesage:
> "Can't delete mm2...
> Access denied"
>
>I realized that I couldn't delete them because some program opened
>in Windows 95 was accesing the files, so I booted from disquette in
>DOS and could delete them. When I booted again in Windows I
>found the cookies revived.
>
>I repeat the procedure, but this time I replace the cookies
>with ASCII files with the same names and made them
>read-only. On booting I began to receive messages about
>dificulty to inicialize caches. I could use IE without the cookies,
>but was continuosly interrumped by the same messages.
>
>I concede, let the cookies live and ask for help to Hotbot support,
>interchanging the correspondence that follows.
>
>I would appreciate any solution to delete the cookies.
>I have tried all the suggestion in the web and shareware programs
> to delete cookies, and they didn't work.
>
>Obviously, besides the cookies mm2048 and mm256, there is
>some program or routine in other place that recreate the cookies.
>
>Thanks in advanced
>Jose.
>***********************************************
>
...
>To: "Wired Digital Support Services" <support@hotbot.com>
>subject: Cookies
>Time: Tue Sep 2 11:44:05 1997
>
>Any time I enter hotbot I get two cookies called
>mm2048.dat and mm256.dat in c:\windows\cookies. Besides, I get similar
>cookies in all the caches. Some of them have grown up until they
>occupied SEVERAL MB.
>How I can get rid of them for ever?
>Thanks in advanced.
>Jose
>----------------------------------
>From: Wired Digital Support Services <support@hotbot.com>
...
>Cc: support@hotbot.com
>Subject: Re: [HotBot #23879] Cookies
>Date: Miércoles 3 de Septiembre de 1997 00:56
>
>Hi there.
>
>You can throw away your cookie file and lock it. Here is the hack for
>locking you file for your browser/platform:
>
>Internet Explorer 3.x
>
> PC:
>
> Cookie file(s) located in: C: Drive ---> Windows folder ---> Cookies
>folder
>
> Type of file: Multiple text files
>
> Solution:
>
> 1.Highlight Cookies folder.
> 2.Hit 3rd button on mouse.
> 3.Select "Properties".
> 4.Click on box that says "Read-Only" to lock the file. Result:
> Folder is made read-only. Cookies
> cannot be written/recorded to folder.
>
>After locking your file, you can turn your cookie warning off. The
>cookies
> will stick around for the browser session, but will disappear when you
>quit and they try to write themselves to a read-only file.
>
>Hope this helps!
> Chris
>
> ***********************************************************************
>
...
>To: "Wired Digital Support Services" <support@hotbot.com>
>Subject: Re: [HotBot #23879] Cookies
>Date: Wed, 3 Sep 1997 10:55:17 -0300
>
>To Chris: Thanks for the tip, but it didn't work.
>I made the dir read-only as you said and deleted the files (booting from
>diskette
>with DOS, because in win95 they are open and can't be deleted),
>but when I start Win95 they appear again in the directories
> \cookies, \temporary internet files\cache1, ...cache2,3 and 4 and
>\history.
>This time they only have 8KB, but after using IE they begin to grow again,
>so there is some routine in WIN95 with all the information to recreate the
>cookies.
>
>Then I write in disquette two text files very shorts, called with
>the names of the cookies (MM2048,DAT and MM256.DAT), replace
>the cookies in all the directories and made them read-only.
>
>When I booted Win95 got the warning:
> "Error Initializing the cache. Shutdown all programs and run
> scandisk or chkdsk. Delete the caches, cookies and history
> directories in your windows directory and then restart IE.
> If the problem persist reinstall IE"
>
>I did it and when I restarted WIN95... VOILA!... the cookies apeared again
>fresh and in good health.
>Jose
>------------
>
>Message-Id: <v03102831b033c667c580@[204.62.132.151]>
>In-Reply-To: <9709031347.AA22957@rina.ara.mil.ar>
>Date: Wed, 3 Sep 1997 19:00:36 -0700
...
>From: Wired Digital Support Services <support@hotbot.com>
>Subject: Re: [HotBot #23879] Cookies
>
>-------------------------
>Hi Jose.
>
>There is a different cookie file for Win95. I haven't had the time to
>research it fully yet, but it works on the same principle. I think it is in
>the Windows file and name something similar.
>
>Good luck!
>Chris
>---------------------------------------------------------------
>
Roger Clarke http://www.anu.edu.au/people/Roger.Clarke/
http://www.etc.com.au/Xamax/
Xamax Consultancy Pty Ltd, 78 Sidaway St, Chapman ACT 2611 AUSTRALIA
Tel: +61 2 6288 1472, and 6288 6916 mailto:Roger.Clarke@anu.edu.au
Visiting Fellow, Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology
The Australian National University Canberra ACT 0200 AUSTRALIA
Information Sciences Building Room 211 Tel: +61 2 6249 3666