Date First Published: 6th September 2022
Topic: Web Design & Development
Subtopic: Web Development
Article Type: Computer Terms & Definitions
Difficulty: MediumDifficulty Level: 5/10
Learn more about what a cookie policy is in this article.
A cookie policy is a document stating all the active cookies and trackers a website uses along with their purposes, technical details, how to opt out, what they track, their duration on web browsers, their provider, and the third parties that data is shared with. A cookie policy is made accessible to visitors as a section of the privacy policy or a separate page. Cookie policies are designed to make visitors more aware of the information that is tracked about them using cookies and how their personal data is processed.
If a website uses cookies that are capable of collecting personally identifiable information or information that can be used to track users to display content relevant to them, then in most countries, a website is legally required to disclose all of the tracking technologies in use on a website. Cookie policies are reflective of an EU data privacy protection law, called GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) and a California law, CCPA (California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018). The cookie policy of a website should always be kept up to date and should be easily accessible. It can often be found by clicking on a hyperlink in the footer of a website, located at the bottom of each webpage that says ‘Cookie policy’ or there is often a hyperlink to it when websites display cookie notices.
A cookie policy and a privacy policy are not the same things. A privacy policy discloses all the ways that a website collects, stores, uses, and protects user’s personal data and focuses on all the aspects of the privacy of users, whilst a cookie policy only deals with the use of cookies and the data that these cookies store. A cookie policy is a type of privacy policy, but it only focuses on one aspect, which is cookies.
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