Why does Hotmail occasionally log me off even though I've said "keep me logged in"?

by

Hotmail logs you off if it can't find a cookie on your computer to identify your login information. To stay logged in you must keep the cookie.
Question:

Hi, Leo. My mom uses Hotmail using IE 9 and would like to always stay logged
in, not having to enter the email and password. The Hotmail window gives the
condition of staying logged in by checking a box: “Keep me logged in”. We do
this, but when you close the browser and go back again to Hotmail it will ask
you to login. The odd part is that this problem occurs every so often and has
worked without this problem for at least two months straight. Now, I suggested
LastPass, which does work, but she would still then have to sign in to that
also. Any solutions?

In this excerpt from
Answercast #92 I look at the result of regularly deleting cookies from your
computer… you won’t stay logged into websites.

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Hotmail logs you off

Typically, when this happens “something” is overwriting, or cleaning, the cookies in your browser.

Deleted cookies

Hotmail, and pretty much any other site that you actually log into, maintains your logged-in state by virtue of keeping a cookie on your machine.

If you are running cookie-cleaning utilities periodically, or if your anti-malware software for some reason is a little too aggressive about cleaning out cookies, this would be the exact scenario that you would see. It would operate exactly like this.

Without cookies you must login

Once the cookies are deleted, you have to re-login to all of the sites, actually, that you happened to be logged in to prior to the cleaning.

So, my advice is to examine your computer’s tools to see if you are running any kind of a cookie clearing or system maintenance utility that may cleaning cookies that you’re unaware of. Double check with your anti-malware tools to make sure that they’re not interfering with cookies.

Ultimately, it all boils down to cookies.

(Transcript lightly edited for readability.)

Next from Answercast 92- Why won’t PDFs open reliably in Thunderbird?

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1 thought on “Why does Hotmail occasionally log me off even though I&apos;ve said "keep me logged in"?”

  1. Another possibility is length of time. Even if you mark ‘keep me logged in’, that only extends the time. It’s not forever. Generally, it will keep your login active for anywhere from a few days to a couple weeks, depending on the program. I only mention this because I know my own mother will sometimes go a few weeks before checking her email.

    Reply

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