Cookies can be set to last until browser exits, or they can be set to expire (be deleted) far into future. Various advertising companies actively abuse this feature - and this has led to public backlash against cookies.

You see, cookies can be created and read when any object is loaded from a web server. This includes banners and web bugs (small graphics designed to help advertisers track who is looking at their ads).

The advertising companies take advantage of this feature to set cookies on your computer so they can build up a picture of what sites you've been looking at. The banners effectively ask "have I seen this person (computer system) before?" If answer is "yes" (a cookie exists), then a notation is made in your profile on advertisers computer system.

Believe me, it does not take long for an advertising agency to build up a very nice understanding of exactly what you do on internet. Why do they want to do this? To make more money, of course.

How does this work? An advertising agency sells eyeballs. The theory they operate on is simple. The more qualified eyeballs, more likely that banners are to be clicked, and more likely that sales are to be made. Thus, if you typically surf, say, Star Trek sites, you may be interested in seeing advertisements about Science Fiction movies, and theoretically you will be more likely to purchase tickets.

Okay, why is this a problem? Do you really want an advertising agency knowing everything about your web surfing habits? Do you trust them? Do you think they will keep this information private?

Or to put it another way, these companies are making money (lots of money) based upon your eyeballs. They are not sharing that money with you - in fact, they never even asked your permission to gather information about you.

As an analogy, suppose you were reading a magazine on a park bench and someone was hiding in tree over your head, recording every page that you looked at in a notebook. How long would you put up with this behavior?

Thus, public is simply objecting to unethical use of cookies to track their movements through internet. And as you can see, a very useful tool has been corrupted by companies whose motives are suspect, to say least.

I used to create a backup of my entire system to a Zip drive once a week. This soon required two zip disks, then 3 and then a dozen. I switched to tape, which helped for a while. Before too long, however, I found my backups took all night long and required several tape changes. This was getting out of hand - not only did backup require an incredible amount of time, but system was slow while it was running and it was obvious that it would be very difficult to do a restore if it became necessary.

At this point, many people make fatal decision to stop performing backups at all. This is not a good idea, as there are many hazards to health of your computer.

- Hundreds and even thousands of new viruses are created monthly. Any one of these could destroy your system and erase years of work. Even if you have best antivirus software on planet, there is still possibility that a new virus could get through your defenses. A hacker could penetrate your firewalls (assuming you have one) and do whatever he pleased. He could, if he wanted, delete files, modify them or even download them to his own system.

- Your system could be damaged or destroyed by more mundane threats such as water leaking from upstairs bathtub or mice chewing on disk cables.

- You could accidentally delete files yourself.

- A new installation of a program or an operating system upgrade could render your system unusable.

- I have heard tales of lightening striking nearby power poles and rendering systems completely unusable.

So if your system is getting so crowded that is is difficult if not impossible to perform a full backup, what do you do to protect yourself?