The Problem:Digital footprints are everywhere. When you use a public computer - at the airport or your hotel's business office, for example - copies of any documents you worked on, as well as any web sites visited, remain on that computer's hard drive for other users to stumble across.
How can you keep your personal documents from the prying eyes of strangers?
The Solution:When it comes to privacy, public computers really are a free-for-all. The best policy is abstinence: don't do anything on the computer that you wouldn't want to read about in the newspapers tomorrow. Refrain from using any logins and passwords or opening any documents that you wouldn't want others to see.
If you have no option and must check your email or work on a file that is private, here's what you should do:
- 1. Check how much access you truly have to the computer's settings. Many times public computers are configured to 'lockout' users from deleting or changing anything. Though this means others will have less opportunity to snoop, it also means you will have a tougher time covering your own tracks.
- 2. When finished using the computer, click on 'Start' located on the toolbar at the bottom of your screen, choose 'Search', then 'For Files or Folders.', then 'All Files and Folders' and finally 'When It Was Modified?' Click the button for 'Specify Dates' and then click 'Search.' Sort the listed files by type and then delete all the files that are yours, including the ones which may have the suffix '*.tmp', which denotes temporary file. Lastly, take your cursor, right-click on the Recycle Bin and choose 'Empty Recycle Bin.'
- 3. To get rid of traces of web sites you've visited, open the same browser you used to access the Internet. If you're using Firefox, click on 'Tools', choose 'Options', choose 'Clear All', 'Clear All Information' and then click on 'OK.'
Internet Explorer is a bit more involved. Launch the browser, click on 'Tools', choose 'Internet Options', click on 'Clear History' and then 'Yes.' Click on 'Delete Cookies' and then 'OK.' Finally, click on 'Delete Files', check-off 'Delete all offline content', click 'OK' and then 'OK.'
Last but not least, when you eventually return to your private computer, consider changing the passwords you may have used on that public computer...just in case someone was monitoring your usage.
