My Hotmail login is not being remembered. How do I correct this problem?
In this excerpt from
Answercast #91, I look at a case where a Hotmail login is not remembered.
It’s gotta be cookies.
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Hotmail login not remembered
Hotmail, like many other sites, uses cookies to remember the fact that you’re logged in. So if, for whatever reason, you’ve clearing cookies – that could instantly explain this problem.
There are a couple of cases where people can be clearing cookies when they don’t necessarily realize it. One is if they’re running a cleanup utility like, perhaps, CCleaner.
If the utility is set to clear cookies by default, then after running CCleaner, it will end up requiring that you login to every site that you had previously remembered: be it Hotmail or Facebook or any of the others.
Virus protection software
The other possibility, of course, is that anti-malware software sometimes has a rather paranoid view of cookies in general. They can sometimes get over aggressive in terms of deleting cookies when they shouldn’t.
Then, as a result, it causes you to be effectively logged out from whatever site you had logged into because the site can’t remember that you’re logged in.
So it’s all about cookies.
Browser cache
The other thing that I would recommend you try is to actually clear your cookies, clear your browser cache in the browser itself. It sounds counter intuitive, but the issue is that sometimes the browser itself can get confused. It can kind of sort of lose track, not only of its cache but its cookies and other things as well.
One way to reset the browser’s notion of how its cookies are stored is to delete them all using the browser’s own “clear your cookies” option.
So, if it’s not obvious where cookies are getting deleted from, and it’s not something that you can easily circumvent – then try clearing the cookies in the browser, relogging into Hotmail and seeing if that then does not keep you logged in.
(Transcript lightly edited for readability.)
Next from Answercast 91- I clicked on a bogus link in spam, what should I do?
Not just the browser cache. I’d suggest a thorough cleanup of temporary files, and possibly other unneeded files. I’ve seen situations where a hard drive with very little free space will cause problems like this.
RE: CCleaner…
When you install a recent version, it gives you the option to remember (not clean away) logins. That way you don’t lose your cookies to hotmail, facebook, bank of america, etc.
Check your browser privacy options to be certain that the “Clear private data on exit” checkbox isn’t checked. If that option got checked by accident that would cause your stored cookies to be deleted when closing your browser.