What happens to my data if I ignore the “accept cookies” button on a website and continue to browse it?
In: Technology
remember when there was this huge deal about privacy and they announced these new measures to control it better and all that? All we got was that annoying ”accept cookies or die” message and changed absolutely nothing
That message is telling you they use cookies or might use them, it isn’t asking your permission. You are accepting that you read the popup. Some sites will close if you hit no/cancel, which is neat.
I’m pretty sure it just continues to use cookies regardless of whether or not you accept it.
That is up to your browser on your computer. The website asks your browser to store cookies on your computer (generally small pieces of information what you did on the website, including “what did the user click last time when we showed this cookie banner”). The browser can simply not do that, or it can delete the cookies as soon as you leave the site or restart your browser, or keep them – all that is configurable.
Well cookies are just a text-string in a key/value pair, so they aren’t doing anything to your data. They’re just storing temporary data about you, either to identify you should you visit again, to keep some settings about you in memory, or to store some miscellanous information that’s better used on the fly than stored in the database (Lat/Lng coordinates can be one if you’ve used a location lookup for stores, as an example).
Cookies aren’t inherently malicious, and can’t be directly traded/used between websites. It’s when used in corellation with other code that they can be used to actually track you, but that’s a active choice on the websites behalf, and it’s only then that there’s any kind of data exchange really happening (profiling you usually).
I’ve noticed on some online employment applications they ask my race, age, sex, and I will ALWAYS check “prefer not to say” because these questions are labeled “optional” and I don’t give anyone any info if I don’t have to.YET sometimes you can’t continue until you fill in the “required information”- you know,the ones saying optional.Ive also seen the question “Are you older than 45?” Wait– it’s not illegal to ask a potential employee that? Yeah,I’ve been sending resumes out for awhile now.Its garbage, and I hate it.
I’m in the digital marketing world, cookies get a very bad rap. Look at it this way, if you’re into say…Hockey. You go to [nhl.com](https://nhl.com), other local hockey sites etc. Would you rather get a hockey related ad (cool retro jersey on sale, etc) OR an ad that you have zero interest in (laundry detergent, or life insurance as examples).
Cookies are used by marketers to send relevant ads, to consumers – so they take interest and buy. The old way of advertising, was based on age/income and some loose’ ‘concepts’ of who these people would be. It didn’t work great, because not everyone who is 24-35 and makes $50k a year, is the same…because people aren’t the same.
Rember, cookies only track your computer – not YOU. That is called PII (personally identifiable information) and it’s a big no-no to get this information from you, unless you opt-in.
Information Security student here, I started working with cookies in the browser this semester, from what I understand (but im no expert) there are different kinds of cookies.
First of all, what is a cookie:
cookies are locally saved data that the browser/website needs to keep track of, but can’t/won’t safe on their servers cause reasons.
From what I know there are many uses for cookies, you have more essential type of cookies, for example the ones that safe the fact that you are logged in, if it didn’t, you’d have to log in every time you do anything…. ather types of important cookies are anti fraud cookies etc. won’t go into those now. usually when you only check essential cookies you only get these. these can be saved for a limited time, or very long.
Cookies can also be used for ather purposes. most of the time when you have to accept them, you are dealing with third party cookies. these are cookies mostly used to keep track of behaviour, trends and intrests. see it as a automatic enquete. this info will be used by the receivers to get insights into their users, and also give you personalized ads and info.
People are always scared that people are looking at your data, and even though I also try to avoid accepting cookies, I don’t believe actual humans are looking at my data. It’s mostly a digital process that will happen automatically and there is a very slim chance that someone is looking at your data specifically. though data is power, so if you don’t like giving these parties your info for free, you have all the rights to decline these cookies.
this is my take though, please add any missing info
Same as if you told the Jiffy Lube guy not to put that little sticker in the upper left corner of your windshield. Nothing.
Depends on the website.
Pro-Tip: Use U-block origin. It blocks many “accept cookies” buttons along with most data collection.
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