COOKIE POLICY
WHAT ARE COOKIES?
Cookies are small files that are stored on a user’s computer. They are designed to contain a modest amount of data specific to the website and can be accessed either by the web server or the client’s computer. This allows the server to deliver a page tailored to a specific user, or the page itself may contain a script that carries the cookie data and, thus, can transport information from one website visit to the next.
ARE COOKIES ENABLED IN MY BROWSER?
To check if your browser is configured to allow cookies, visit the Cookie Checker. This page will attempt to create a cookie and report whether it succeeded or not.
For information on how to enable or disable cookies, see “Enabling Cookies.”
For information on clearing and deleting cookies, see “Deleting Cookies.”
Can I view/see the cookies on my computer?
Most browsers have a settings screen that allows the user to see which cookies have been stored on the computer and optionally delete them. For more information, see the cookie preview page.
Please note that it is not possible for a webpage to view cookies set by other sites, as this would pose a privacy and security issue.
WHAT’S IN A COOKIE?
Each cookie is essentially a small lookup table containing pairs of values (key, data) – for example, (first name, John) (last name, Smith). Once the cookie has been read by the code on the server or client computer, the data can be retrieved and used to properly customize the web page.
When are cookies created?
Writing data to a cookie usually occurs when a new web page is loaded – for example, after pressing a “Submit” button, the data management page will be responsible for storing the values in a cookie. If the user has chosen to disable cookies, then the writing operation will fail, and subsequent websites relying on cookies will need to take implicit action or ask the user to re-enter the information stored in the cookie.
WHY ARE COOKIES USED?
Cookies are a convenient way to transport information from one session on a website to another or between sessions on related websites without needing to load a server with massive amounts of data storage. Storing data on a server without using cookies would also be problematic, as it would be difficult to obtain information about a specific user without requiring authentication on each website visit.
If there is a large amount of information to be stored, then a cookie can simply be used as a means of identifying a specific user, so that additional related information can be looked up in a database on the server. For example, the first time a user visits a site, they may choose a username that is stored in a cookie and then may provide data such as password, name, address, preferred font size, page appearance, etc. – all this information would be stored in the database using the username as a key. Later, when the site is revisited, the server will read the cookie to find the username and then retrieve all the user information from the database without re-entering them.
HOW LONG DOES A COOKIE LAST?
The expiration time of a cookie can be set when the cookie is created. By default, the cookie is destroyed when the current browser window is closed, but an arbitrary period can persist thereafter.
WHO CAN ACCESS COOKIES?
When a cookie is created, its visibility can be controlled by setting the “root domain.” It will then be accessible to any URL belonging to that respective root. For example, the root could be set to “whatarecookies.com,” and the cookie would then be available to sites like “www.whatarecookies.com” or “xyz.whatarecookies.com” or “whatarecookies.com.” This can be used to allow related pages to “communicate” with each other. It is not possible to set the root domain to top-level domains such as “.com” or “.co.uk” because this would allow broad access to the cookie.
By default, cookies are visible to all paths within their domain, but at the time of creation, they can be restricted to a specific subpath – for example, “www.whatarecookies.com/images.”
HOW SECURE ARE COOKIES?
There are many concerns regarding privacy and security on the Internet. Cookies, in themselves, do not pose a threat to privacy, as they can only be used to store information that the user has voluntarily provided or already has with the web server. Although this information may be made available to certain third-party websites, it is no worse than storing it in a central database. If you are concerned that the information you provide to a web server will not be considered confidential, then you should question whether you actually need to provide this information.
WHAT ARE TRACKING COOKIES?
Some commercial websites include embedded advertising materials provided by a third-party site, and such ads may store a cookie for that third-party site, containing information provided from the hosting site – such information may include the name of the site, certain products viewed, pages visited, etc. When the user subsequently visits another site that contains a similar embedded ad from the same third-party site, the advertising agent will be able to read the cookie and use it to determine some information about the user’s browsing history.