If This Browser Could Talk: Safari Private Surfing *Not* So Private
Tisk, Tisk, Tisk. You people know who you are! You think a little check mark next to “Private Browsing” in Safari will keep your slick surfing habits secret? No, No dear reader! Safari will squeal on you! Doesn’t matter even if you quit the application or reset Safari.
It seems Safari like leaving little trails of what it does in its cache. If you open up the Terminal in MacOS 10.5 and type in:
dscacheutil -cachedump -entries Host
You will see a list of all the websites you visited even with private browsing enabled.
To destroy this last bit of evidence in Terminal type in:
dscacheutil -flushcache
This will purge Safaris secret cache and keep your little indiscretions secret.
Its also important to note that this cache is also emptied when you log out of your user account or restart your computer. Seems like Apple’s little code monkeys will need to code a little harder to fix this little snafu. All evil lurks in the logs!
Thanks to Tim for the tip! Safe surfing!
It looks as if it keeps a record of Firefox browsing as well.
This is simply your machine’s DNS cache… it has absolutely nothing to do with Safari. Hostnames will show up in the DNS cache if *anything* on your computer requests them. Not saying that this isn’t a security problem, but it’s not Safari’s problem.
–Quentin
I should probably point out that this is the DNS cache for the entire system that you’re viewing/clearing – and thusly will contain a list of webservers with which communication has been established (or more acurately, DNS lookups have occurred against those servers) from *any* application in the system.
So, technically, if you use Firefox’s ‘Clear Private Data’, you’ll still need to flush the cache to remove any traces. The same would occur if you were to ping a server, check email, or perform just about any internet communication, really.
The purpose of the DNS cache, of course, is to prevent the system from constantly have to re-look up the IPs (and other DNS data) of servers which it has already requested of your DNS server – which has a significant latency in and of itself.
ok I’m really curious… why is safari displayed running in windows in that picture?
Mike D safari is available to windows
…. I .. wow *looks up* “oooooohhh” *moves big ass rock*
Uhm, this isn’t Safari’s secret cache. This is system level cacheing. While the majority of DNS lookups are done by Safari – Mail, iChat and anything that needs to resolve DNS names writes to and reads from this cache. It’s not a bug or “snafu.”
What about /private/var/folders then? Does it cache in there when private browsing is enabled?
I would be happy if I could simply get rid of ancient websites names that come up in the address field as autocompleted ’suggestions’- Can this ‘autocomplete’ function be disabled in Safari? Thanks
Why do you need private browsing in the first place? If there’s something you need to hide, you need to be in counseling. Be ashamed.
Suzanne:
Some people would consider privacy important when looking up health matters or resources for dealing with domestic violence. Hopefully they don’t run into people as judgmental as you as they tackle these matters. Not everybody who wants Internet privacy is surfing porn, you know.
@Suzanne
wow… just wow.
I won’t even go in the magnitude of how incorrect that statement is, but you should really step back and think about what personal privacy means on a much larger scale than say looking at porn.
Pete def. nailed it. Put yourself in a hypothetical situation where you would like to keep your online activities under wraps. Lets say for example you’re planning your kids surprise party or maybe you’ve gotten a yeast infection and don’t want your roommate who uses your computer to know. What if you’re a recovering alcoholic and attend a groups/communities online for support and don’t want someone visiting to know about your illness that you’re already seeking treatment for. I mean there are countless cases where something as simple as privacy speaks magnitudes for your ability to truly express and be comfortable with yourself.
Next time you’re in the shower think about replacing one entire wall of your home with giant sheet of glass. How comfortable or safe do you feel now doing something as common as exercising basic human hygiene.
I really hope at least one of the points raised makes you think beyond being incredibly… if not blindingly judgmental and self righteous.
For the sake of all of us… yourself included.
I’m ashamed…come on isn’t that the entire reason the internet was made….other things on the internet…that’s just crazy talk….well for that and the politicians to sell their smut…
Is there a way to do the same thing in 10.4?
dscacheutil doensn’t work there, so what would the lookupd-equivalent be?