All Things Microsoft > Microsoft Software
Easy Removal of Windows Super Hidden Temp Files
Aloone_Jonez:
Since Windows XP removes the content from these files anyway when you delete your history and temporary Internet files anyway this doesn't serve any purpose.
However it might be worth while to do this on pre-Windows 2000 systems. By the way if Explorer is running while you try to delete these files it won't work since it's using the files.
Jenda:
How would this work in win2k? I'm planning to add them to my Ubuntu computer sometime, I even left the first ten gigs on the harddisk free for them.
OperationUndermind:
--- Quote from: Aloone_Jonez ---Since Windows XP removes the content from these files anyway when you delete your history and temporary Internet files anyway this doesn't serve any purpose.
Sorry, no time for love, Dr. Jonez.
You are mistaken.
These files are NOT deleted.
Ever heard of "Content.ie5"?
Try looking at the properties of your "Temporary Internet Files" folder. There are folders that DO NOT show up in the icon view (yes, even with "show hidden files" turned on), but that are nonetheless there and storing all your surfing history, site graphics files and even emails you send.
Maybe even try a manual delete of everything in the "Temporary Internet Files" folder and looking at the properties of the seemingly "empy" folder again...
Those same inaccessible folders are still there and so is all that porn you have been looking at for all these years without doing something about these hundreds of megabytes of breadcrumb, telltale files.
So, keep on thinking that these files don't exist or that Windows is actually deleting ALL your internet files and history when you click the "delete files" and "clear history" buttons in internet options.
Keep on thinking that I went through the trouble of researching the issue, installing a "cleaner" app in my startup file and posting a message to the forum.
Keep on thinking that this is all a hoax and that thousands of other people out there are just paranoid and out of a severe case of boredom go about writing useless apps to delete files that aren't there in some kind of purposeless intellectual exercise. It's your bit-trail buddy, not mine.
What I find truly disconcerting is that you appear to be a long time techie who should have known about this issue long ago and that you come across as if you are actually DEFENDING Microsoft's integrity...like you think they don't mislead us, spy on us or collect personally identifying information and track our internet activity? Right.
Now, trying to get us to believe that really "doesn't serve any purpose."
:nothappy: o p e r a t i o n u n d e r m i n d :nothappy:
--- End quote ---
Aloone_Jonez:
I've being arguing this point for a long time, I am not defending Microsoft I'm just being fair to them. These files are no big scam to find out what everyone is looking at on the Internet if they wanted to do that they would've come up something far more devious than this.
On Windows 9x I'm sure the contents of the files still remain after you've deleted your temporary internet files, but with Windows XP the files still remain in place but their contents have gone.
Try this, in your normal user account browse the Internet for anything, and remember some of the websites you've visited. Create annother user account as WMD said and look at the files in Explorer, look at the size of the index files, veiw them with a text editor and you'll see the names of the pages you've visited. Now log off your special account and log back in to your normal account, delete the files the usal way in Internet Explorer. You'l find when you view them with you other account they'll still be there but they'll be a lot smaller and if use a text editor you'll notice all the website names are gone.
This is the case with my machine running XP home edition sp 2 with all the updates installed, don't know about Windows 2000, but the article is out of date as far as XP goes.
Appendum:
Here's a screenshot of the index.dat files open in notepad, before the deletion is on the left and after is on the right, notice how all the porn sites have gone they've been replaced with a repeating pattern of bytes, the only site left was the MSN (the default homepage in IE).
So for your self I've uploaded my index.dat files, you can view them in a text editor such as notepad, I recommend using the word wrap option.
index.dat before deleting.
index.dat after.
I was wrong about one thing the files are the same size before and after, but the information contained with in them has gone - it's been overwritten.
Of course this doesn't prove anything, I could've easily faked this, so I urge you to do the same experiment so you can see for yourself.
EDIT:
I forgot to say that Microsoft didn't mean any ill intent by not deleting the files in Windows 9x it was just a bug caused by poor programming.
Kintaro:
Yep, this is a myth even under Windows 2000, and it is busted.
http://www.microsuck.com/forums/showthread.php?p=101866#post101866
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