Why It is so Important to Delete My Recent Documents

A common mistake computer users all over the world make is they forego the deletion of the documents that they have recently accessed or opened. Surely you must have forgotten to delete My Recent Documents from your system at one point or another. This is something you should never forget to do, particularly if you are sharing your computer with another person, a colleague perhaps.

When you click the Start Menu that can be found usually at the bottom left portion of your screen, you can find a list of the recent documents that you accessed while using that particular computer. Now, Windows incorporated this feature so that it would be easier for users to just access the recent documents they worked on. This is a convenient feature to have because you no longer have to open your My Documents folder and browse through the different files and folders you recently worked on. Still, there are certain security risks that come with the use of this feature.

Let us say that you work a firm that handles credit transactions for its clients. You have so much power in your hands – which you should not abuse in any way – since you know practically everything there is to know about your clients’ credit information. As you go about your work, you will surely access files that contain vital credit information about your clients. When your shift is over, another employee takes your station, which is a typical scenario in most of today's companies. Even if that other employee would have his or her own account on the shared PC, there is still that risk that he or she can access the recently opened documents from your account. This is something you should not risk because in spite of the confidentiality clause that comes with the job; there will certainly be instances that temptation would be just too strong for you and your colleagues. Thus, it would be better to just delete the history of the recent documents accessed all together.

This is actually very easy to do. All you have to do is right-click on the task bar. This is the bar right where the Start Menu can be found. From there, you can then find the tab Properties and click on it. When you are inside Properties already, click the Advanced tab. You can then find the option to Clear List, right under the Recent Documents tab. Click on that, then click OK. This would then clear your Recent Documents folder; however, this is just a temporary action. This is not a surefire way of clearing the contents from your hard disk permanently. You may have to visit your Recycle Bin and empty out the contents so that you can get rid of those Recent Documents permanently.

Do not just stop there! After you delete My Recent Documents from your system, you should also clear your temporary files, your cookies, as well as your browsing history. This way, no traces of your computer and Internet activity would ever be found by the person who would use your computer after you. Moreover, you can exercise your right to privacy, as well as that of the clients you are handling.