What are temporary internet files used for?

When you use a web browser to access a page on the internet, it is usually made up of several files - each image will be at least one file, there may well be "flash" elements also separate files. The browser will keep local copies of these files and the next time you go to that webpage, instead of downloading all the image and flash files again, it uses the local copies. These local copies are temporary Internet files. You can safely delete them, and the next time you go to a website, the entire page will be downloaded again.l