What is a cookie?
A cookie is a harmless text file that is stored in your browser when you visit almost any webpage. The purpose of the cookie is to allow the website to remember your visit when you return to browse that page. Although many people don’t know this, cookies have been in use for 20 years, since the first browsers for the World Wide Web appeared.
What isn’t a cookie?
It is not a virus, trojan, worm, spam, spyware, or does it open pop-up windows.
What information does a cookie store?
Cookies usually don’t store sensitive information about you, such as credit cards or banking data, photographs, your ID, or personal information, etc. The data they store are technical, personal preferences, content customization, etc.
The web server does not associate you as a person but your web browser. In fact, if you normally browse with Internet Explorer and try browsing the same site with Firefox or Chrome, you will see that the website does not recognize you as the same person because it is actually associating the browser, not the person.
What types of cookies exist?
- Technical cookies: These are the most basic and allow, among other things, to know when a human or an automated application is browsing, when an anonymous or registered user is navigating, basic tasks for the operation of any dynamic web.
- Analytical cookies: These collect information about the type of navigation you are doing, the sections you use most, products consulted, usage time, language, etc.
- Advertising cookies: These display advertising based on your navigation, country of origin, language, etc.
- Personalization cookies: These are the ones that allow the user to access the service with some predefined general characteristics based on a series of criteria in the user’s terminal, such as language or the type of browser used to connect to the service.
What are first-party cookies and third-party cookies?
First-party cookies are generated by the page you are visiting, and third-party cookies are generated by external services or providers such as Facebook, Twitter, Google, etc.
What happens if I disable cookies?
To help you understand the impact of disabling cookies, here are a few examples:
- You won’t be able to share content from that site on Facebook, Twitter, or any other social network.
- The website will not be able to adapt content to your personal preferences, as is often the case in online stores.
- You will not be able to access the personal area of that website, such as My account, My profile, or My orders.
- Online stores: It will be impossible for you to make online purchases; they will have to be made via phone or by visiting the physical store if available.
- You won’t be able to personalize your geographic preferences, such as time zone, currency, or language.
- The website will not be able to perform web analytics on visitors and traffic on the site, which will make it harder for the site to remain competitive.
- You will not be able to post on the blog, upload photos, post comments, rate or score content. The website will also not know if you are a human or an automated application that posts spam.
- Targeted advertising won’t be shown, which will reduce the website’s advertising revenue.
- All social networks use cookies; if you disable them, you won’t be able to use any social network.
Can cookies be deleted?
Yes. Not only can they be deleted, but they can also be blocked, either in general or specifically for a particular domain.
Here are the links to access cookie settings in the most common browsers:
Configure cookies in Google Chrome
Configure cookies in Microsoft Internet Explorer
