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Make Private Browsing More Private

Published in Multiple CategoriesWindows 7 Security Tweaks
Windows Vista Security Tweaks
Windows XP Security Tweaks
 by Steve Sinchak with 30,789 views

Privacy features such as InPrivate browsing in Internet Explorer 8 and similar features in Chrome and Firefox promise to protect your privacy by not keeping track of page history, temporary files and cookies. This may be enough to hide your tracks from a beginner computer user but there are still traces of what sites you visit within the local DNS cache. An advanced user can run the ipconfig /displaydns command to view the most recent sites visited.

For example, when you start InPrivate browsing in Internet Explorer and visit Bing.com.

 

The DNS Cache shows where you have been.

The best way to improve the privacy of your InPrivate browsing sessions is to also clear the local DNS cache after closing the browser. Open up an administrative level command prompt and type ipconfig /flushdns and hit Enter.

 
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Comments
maddi
شكرا
thanks
194 days ago
NoAdmin
When you want to use private session you're not admin, so you can't clear dns cache.
194 days ago
Steve Sinchak
I believe that the local DNS cache is machine based so you can clear that for all users by opening up an administrative level command prompt using admin credentials and then run the above command.
194 days ago
Jmanay04
Hey you know what, I totally took what you said and made me a batch file called log off and it is cool because it will flush the DNS records and then log me off. Thanks for the advice.

Jmanay04
139 days ago
guest
fwiw, ccleaner will do this
110 days ago
Stsn
How do i make the windows stay open. it there for a few milliseconds and i am unable to view it at all
96 days ago
somewebfellow
@Stsn - you need to run the cmd above from the cmd prompt window, not the Run box. In the Run box, type 'cmd' to open up a prompt window before issuing the ipconfig cmd. Type 'exit' to close the window.

@Steve - I believe you talked right over NoAdmin's point - which is if the user is NOT an admin user, they very well may have NO "admin credentials" to use in order to flush the cache. Since flushing is strictly an admin privilege, the non-admin user is out of luck here!

I see this on a lot of tips where the authors fail to mention to readers that whatever they are recommending in many cases requires Admin privileges to in order to carry out the instructions!

You do say "Open up an administrative level command prompt" but many folks miss that subtle qualification".
29 days ago
 
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