EU cookie law

[wjfox]

Anybody else here affected by this?

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Cookie law: websites must seek consent from this weekend

Comments (261)
By Dave Lee Technology reporter, BBC News

Friday marks the last working day for UK businesses to prepare their websites for a new law governing the use of cookies.

From Sunday, sites must obtain "informed consent" from visitors before saving cookies on a machine.

Cookies are pieces of personal data stored when users browse the web, sometimes to power advertising.

The Information Commissioners Office (ICO) is to launch a tool for the public to report non-compliant sites.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-18194235

[Core Rising]

Obligatory..

[wjfox]

How am I supposed to track visitors if most will opt out? What about my ad revenue which is based on cookies?

[Core Rising]

Is it possible to set it so people have their cookies tracked unless they opt out? Most people won’t bother opting out. Or you could have a landing page like porn websites do. People have to accept your terms and conditions, i.e. agree to have their cookies tracked in order to access your website. If they opt out, they may not proceed to the Future Timeline homepage. Problem solved.

[DBadger]

Shit, I just had to edit a quick disclaimer into all my websites. They have NOT informed us enough of this.

Ugh :S

How are you supposed to serve a different site to cookie opt-ins and opt-outs without storing a cookie on their machine for that choice?

Regardless, my game needs cookies and javascript to work so nope guys you won't be able to play it without them, nyah nyah.

This law is insane, cookies are a basic function of a web browser. More Internet laws by people who don't understand the Internet.

[SimonTheSoundMan]

Which British law is this in?

So, the EU want me to ask the user to opt-in to having tracking cookies. I have no control over most of the cookies on my own web site. For example, Google Analytics or Adsense. If I remove these, I have no easy way to make analytics and no way to make any revenue. I use wordpress, it stores a cookie even before the web page is rendered.

Is there a wordpress plugin to disable cookies?

[gothicform]

Originally Posted by DBadger

Shit, I just had to edit a quick disclaimer into all my websites. They have NOT informed us enough of this.

Ugh :S

How are you supposed to serve a different site to cookie opt-ins and opt-outs without storing a cookie on their machine for that choice?

Regardless, my game needs cookies and javascript to work so nope guys you won't be able to play it without them, nyah nyah.

This law is insane, cookies are a basic function of a web browser. More Internet laws by people who don't understand the Internet.

the law fails to identify the difference between cookies that provide functionality for an individual website, and networks that use cookies across multiple websites.

[SimonTheSoundMan]

I have just been researching how to get the opt-in dialogue for Wordpress.

To display the opt-in dialogue, you first need to store a cookie to get the option and this happends before the page is downloaded, then to store the option the user chose you need to erm, store a tracking cookie on the users machine so the option is saved between pages.

[KingNick]

Was I the only person to think this whole thing is about real cookies? Now it makes sense.

[WatcherZero]

Originally Posted by SimonTheSoundMan

Which British law is this in?

So, the EU want me to ask the user to opt-in to having tracking cookies. I have no control over most of the cookies on my own web site. For example, Google Analytics or Adsense. If I remove these, I have no easy way to make analytics and no way to make any revenue. I use wordpress, it stores a cookie even before the web page is rendered.

Is there a wordpress plugin to disable cookies?

No you only have to provide informed consent, basically tell them that you are going to store a cookie unless they explicitly say no.

Couple of ways you could comply, either store their IP address as a consent/refusal list or have a splash page and confirmation dialog, if they get past the page with no cookie installed assume they said no.

[makita09]

Originally Posted by wjfox

How am I supposed to track visitors if most will opt out? What about my ad revenue which is based on cookies?

I assume you're not supposed to, and to hell with your ad revenues. Seems to be the sentiment.

Its not a long term problem, the only reason why cookies are necessary atm is because it has evolved that way, other options will be developed that don't inherently put individual users at risk from the unscrupulous.

[gothicform]

Originally Posted by makita09

I assume you're not supposed to, and to hell with your ad revenues. Seems to be the sentiment.

Its not a long term problem, the only reason why cookies are necessary atm is because it has evolved that way, other options will be developed that don't inherently put individual users at risk from the unscrupulous.

SSN manages to have no cookies at all. i did a check. why would i want to track the users to start with that way?

we do track other things, like searches on the site but we don't record WHO searches for what, simply what is being searched for. i can then say
london 572159
leeds 279742
sheffield 173714
manchester 104292
birmingham 72734
glasgow 59834
liverpool 37373
belfast 23496
dublin 23113
newcastle upon tyne 22890

we have no idea what the user did after they searched for london, we aren't tracking users. people just need to approach advertising from a different way.

[DBadger]

Cookies are used for much more than tracking users, they're one of the most important aspects of a web browser, as HTTP is a stateless language. It's the only real way to keep data between page changes.

[gothicform]

Originally Posted by DBadger

Cookies are used for much more than tracking users, they're one of the most important aspects of a web browser, as HTTP is a stateless language. It's the only real way to keep data between page changes.

quite. what i don't get is why they didn't just make it so you need permission to track users ACROSS sites.