What a cookie is?
A cookie is a harmless text file that is stored in your browser when you visit almost any web page. The usefulness of the cookie is that the website is able to remember your visit when you return to navigate that page. Although many people do not know this, cookies have been used for 20 years, when the first browsers for the World Wide Web appeared.
What a cookie is not?
It’s not a virus, a Trojan, a worm, spam, spyware, or pop-up windows.
What information does a cookie store?
Cookies do not usually store sensitive information about you, such as credit cards or bank details, photographs, your ID or personal information, etc. The data they store is of a technical nature, personal preferences, personalization of contents, etc.
The web server does not associate you as a person but with your web browser. In fact, if you usually surf the web with Internet Explorer and try browsing the same site with Firefox or Chrome you will see that the site does not realize that you are the same person because you are actually associating the browser, not the person.
What kind of cookies are there?
- Technical Cookies: These are the most basic and allow, among other things, to know when a human being or an automated application is surfing, when an anonymous and registered user is surfing, basic tasks for the operation of any dynamic website.
- Analysis Cookies: Collect information on the type of navigation you are doing, the sections you use most, products consulted, time of use, language, etc.
- Advertising Cookies: Display advertising based on your navigation, country of origin, language, etc.
What are own and third-party cookies?
Own cookies are those generated by the page you are visiting and those of third parties are those generated by external services or providers such as Facebook, Twitter, Google, etc.
What happens if I turn off cookies?
To help you understand the extent to which you can disable cookies, here are some examples:
- You may not share content from that website on Facebook, Twitter or any other social network.
- The website will not be able to adapt the contents to your personal preferences, as is often the case in online shops.
- You will not be able to access the personal area of that site, such as My Account, or My Profile or My Orders.
- Online shops: It will be impossible for you to make online purchases, they will have to be by telephone or by visiting the physical shop if they have one.
- It will not be possible to customize your geographical preferences such as time zone, currency or language.
- The website will not be able to perform web analytics on visitors and web traffic, which will make it difficult for the website to be competitive.
- You may not blog, upload photos, post comments or rate content. The web site will also not be able to tell if you are a human being or an automated application that publishes spam.
- It will not be possible to show sectorized advertising, which will reduce the advertising revenue of the website.
- All social networks use cookies, if you turn them off you will not be able to use any social networks.
Can cookies be deleted?
Yes. Not only delete, but also block, generally or particularly for a specific domain.
To delete cookies from a website, you must go to the settings of your browser and there you can search for the cookies associated with the domain in question and proceed to their removal.
Cookie settings for most popular browsers
Here’s how to access a particular cookie on your Chrome browser. Note: These steps may vary depending on the browser version:
- Go to Settings or Preferences using the File menu or by clicking on the personalization icon at the top right.
- You will see different sections, click on the Show advanced options option.
- Go to Privacy, Content Settings.
- Select All cookies and site data.
- A list of all cookies sorted by domain will appear. To make it easier for you to find the cookies for a particular domain, enter part or all of the address in the Search for Cookies field.
- After making this filter, one or more lines will appear on the screen with the cookies of the requested website. Now all you have to do is select it and press X to proceed to its removal.
To access the cookie settings of your Internet Explorer browser, follow these steps (they may vary depending on your browser version):
- Go to Tools, Internet Options
- Click on Privacy.
- Move the slider to the desired privacy level.
To access your Firefox browser’s cookie settings follow these steps (they may vary depending on your browser version):
- Go to Options or Preferences depending on your operating system.
- Click on Privacy.
- Under History choose Use a custom setting for history.
- You will now see the Accept cookies option, which you can enable or disable
according to your preferences.
To access your browser’s Safari for OSX cookie settings follow these steps (may vary depending on browser version):
- Go to Preferences, then Privacy.
- Here you will see the Block Cookies option to set the type of block you want to make.
To access your browser’s Safari for iOS cookie settings, follow these steps (may vary
depending on browser version):
- Go to Settings, then Safari.
- Under Privacy and Security, you will see the Block Cookies option to set the type of
block you want to make.
To access your browser’s cookie settings for Android devices follow these steps (may vary depending on browser version):
- Run the browser and press the Menu key, then Settings.
- Under Security and Privacy, you will see the Accept Cookies option to select or clear
the check box.
To access your browser’s cookie settings for Windows Phone devices follow these steps (they may vary depending on your browser version):
- Open Internet Explorer, then More, then Settings.
- You can now enable or disable the Allow cookies check box.
Cookies Advisor is a created by Carlos Doral (webartesanal.com)
