What everyone should know about the new ICO cookie regulations. Call it what you like, the ICO e-privacy law, the cookie directive, or to give it its proper name, Directive 2002/58/EC, but on the 26th May 2011, the law regarding how online business can use cookies for storing information on users’ devices changed.
What does that mean for you? It means ensuring you’re compliant with the new law and avoiding a potential fine of up to £500,000. You have my attention, but what’s a cookie? In technology terms, a cookie is file which gets downloaded on to a device when a user accesses your site. Cookies allow a website to recognise a user’s device and store information, which can be used to analyse customer behaviours, this can be anything from log-in details and browsing history, to shopping cart contents.
Testimony. Research/stats. Government. Blogs. Media. EU Cookie Law - Are You Ready? Python - how to find out whether website is using cookies or http based authentication. EU Cookie Compliance Edges Closer FirstFound Blog. It’s just over two weeks until controversial European privacy laws on cookies come into effect in the UK.
But, as we covered back in March, the government still haven’t given any solid advice. We’ve been fairly critical of the EU’s online privacy policies before now, and this development is no different. While cookies are used to streamline a user’s online experience, speed up browsing, and provide webmasters with important data (like how many of you have read this article), the EU guidelines seem to think that they’re used to “[create] detailed profiles of an individual’s browsing activity”. Despite the fact that this isn’t really the case, the government have issued a PDF explaining the new regulations in a roundabout way.