Cookies are alphanumeric identifiers that we transfer to your computer's hard drive through your Web browser to enable our systems to recognize your browser and to provide features such as storage of items in your Shopping Cart between visits. The "help" portion of the toolbar on most browsers will tell you how to prevent your browser from accepting new cookies, how to have the browser notify you when you receive a new cookie, or how to disable cookies altogether.

Yes. Whether you use Internet Explorer or Netscape, your cookies are saved to a simple text file that you can delete as you please. In order to do this properly, remember to close your browser first. This is because all your cookies are held in memory until you close your browser. So, if you delete the file with your browser open, it will make a new file when you close it, and your cookies will be back.

NO. A cookie is a simple piece of text. It is not a program, or a plug-in. It cannot be used as a virus, and it cannot access your hard drive. Your browser (not a programmer) can save cookie values to your hard disk if it needs to, but that is the limit of the effect on your system.

Yes, you should expect the occasional cookie to make it through to your browser. We know of at least three ways this can happen; please tell us if you find any others. One way is in secure documents, which are explained below. A few sites set cookies using a line such as <META HTTP-EQUIV="Set-Cookie" CONTENT="flavor=chocolate"> in the HEAD section of an HTML document. Cookies can also be set and read in JavaScript.

Internet cookies are small text files (no larger than 4Kb) used for keeping track of settings or data for a particular Web site (like EyewearLand.com). Because servers do not know who is making a request, they have no way of storing settings for specific users. Cookies are a very secure way of maintaining data that is specific to a particular user because your browser will only send the settings back to the server that originally created them.