August 1, 2010

This month, we are going to discuss In-Private browsing (Internet Explorer), also called Protected browsing, etc. in other browsers.  I'm going to concentrate on IE since that's the browser included with Windows and it is also the most popular.  You may ask "What is it and why should I use it"?  Since browsing security is such a big issue today, you want to be protected as much as possible when you are searching the web. Social networking sites are a good place to end up with problems, either from content you are viewing while there, or from friends ending up with a virus or malware which sends you an email from them which causes you to download the malware when you open their email.  Many sites contain links to download the software while you are viewing the content there.

When you are surfing the net, Internet Explorer keeps track of much of you actions, such as a history of sites you visit, cookies (little programs sites download to your computer so their site works correctly), temporary Internet files (again so pages work correctly and faster), form data you enter for many sites in order to enter and use the site, and a few other technical items.  In-Private browsing prevents these items from being saved and loaded on your computer, which protects you from any form of malware or viruses which depend on these items to infect your computer.

In-Private browsing will not delete any favorites you add during the session, and it will not delete any changes you make like changing the home page.  These items will be retained after you exit the session.

Any toolbars and extensions you ordinarily use will be disabled when you start the In-Private session.  If you want to use them you need to enable them once the session starts.

To start an In-Private session, either start Internet Explorer, then click on the In-Private icon on the toolbar,

or, if you are using Windows Vista or Windows 7 and you have an icon on the taskbar, you can right click on the icon, then left click on Start InPrivate Browsing.

As a side note, some sites may not work correctly using this browsing method, but most will and you will have a lot of added protection while browsing.