What are cookies

When on the computer I have come across a lot of sites which asks that you accept cookies, as I haven't a clue what these are I just leave the site and try somewhere else, but that is getting more and more difficult to do that, so can anyone tell me what cookies are and what they will do to my computer, in simple terms please

They are files on your computer that contain bits of information. A lot of companies use them to hold your username for the site for example so garden&gossip could have 'spec' in a file on your PC.
Other uses are to record the sort of things you like looking at so if you shop on line, they might know you order oats a lot so suggest that next time you are ordering. These uses are ok.
A lot of sites make money from advertising so like to store more info about you. so if you look at greenhouses, then you visit other sites, you will see adverts for greenhouses. They are not usually malicious but can tend that way with some of the things some companies use them for, particularly some types of 'market research'. A lot of firms can make money (which is what it is ll about) by tracking what you are up to on the web. Probably the google search engine together with gmail is one application that collects a lot of data about you.

You can delete all the cookies from a browser which I do occasionally but it does mean you need to remember all the logins for sites you visit as everything disappears.
All browsers have different facilities. I use firefox and for example, that has an option to delete all cookies and site data when firefox closes. You can enter sites as exceptions to this. So you could put in your bank and garden&gossip as you trust these sites.

Thanks Mark, I think I will continue avoiding them as much as possible, I am not comfortable with people or sites I don't know keeping information about me

I use https://duckduckgo.com/ as my search engine - not google unless desperate.
Doesn't stop the cookies on sites that I visit though.

^^^^^ Never heard of that Veggie and as I don't know much about search engines will that still give me access to interesting sites and if I changed to it would I need to reload? G&G

Thanks Mark, I think I will continue avoiding them as much as possible, I am not comfortable with people or sites I don't know keeping information about me

You re well advised to avoid sites you are not comfortable with. I often leave sites that don't let you see what sort of cookies they are storing but I think most sites use cookies to some extent.
I've just looked at my PC an it shows that garden and gossip has 6 cookies there and growfruitandveg has 12, so likely you have some.

   

Thanks Mark, I think I will continue avoiding them as much as possible, I am not comfortable with people or sites I don't know keeping information about me

You re well advised to avoid sites you are not comfortable with. I often leave sites that don't let you see what sort of cookies they are storing but I think most sites use cookies to some extent.
I've just looked at my PC an it shows that garden and gossip has 6 cookies there and growfruitandveg has 12, so likely you have some.

Hi Mark

How do you get that display please?

Just as a point of interest, all cookies used by GandG are purely functional...username, password etc.

The site does not use tracking cookies as we dont allow any external providers access to your data, in adition we are add free.

The cookies we use are classed as technical and fully comply with EU requirements

The technical cookies are used to remember your username/password, and posts you havent yet read.

On the firefox menu, I have a 'Protections Dashboard' and on that 'manage your privacy and security settings' where for cookies and site data, you can manage data. I'm using Ubuntu operating system at the moment.

On the firefox menu, I have a 'Protections Dashboard' and on that 'manage your privacy and security settings'  where for cookies and site data, you can manage data. I'm using Ubuntu operating system at the moment.

Ok thanks will take a look.

I'm moving to Linux (pop os) at the moment, Mrs B is getting my windows laptop as her work one needs to go back after her redundancy.

I love resurrecting old laptops with Linux