What do we really mean when we talk about âcookiesâ? To start on the right foot, letâs clear up a common misunderstanding.
When we say âcookies,â weâre actually using a bit of shorthand. A cookie, strictly speaking, is a small file stored in a visitorâs browser. But today, itâs just one of many ways to collect data.
In reality, many tools can track a visitorâs activity on a website:
scripts that send information to third-party services (like Google or Meta),
small bits of code that remember a visitorâs behavior (like their language preference or which pages they viewed),
or even more invisible techniques that can identify a device without storing anything at all.
đ In short, the word âcookiesâ is used as a general term for all these data collection mechanisms that are regulated by data protection laws â like the GDPR in Europe, the UK GDPR, or the CCPA in California.
These are the ones that must be subject to user consent when the law requires it.
âïž In the next articles of this series, weâll mostly use the terms âservicesâ or âvendorsâ to describe these trackers, to better reflect the variety of data collection methods out there.