Cookies!

closed

Cookies aren't essential to view a bit of html, neither are all the other invasive tracking methods used across the net. The fact so many sites force them upon us, well before any login or shopping takes place, is because they can, not because they need to, inorder to make a site function.

corbyboy

yangptangkipperbang wrote: »

Set your system to accept only cookies from the site you visit, NO 3rd party cookies and auto clear ALL cookies on logging out - you will be amazed at the difference.............

Rejecting third party cookies is fine. Clearing cookies on closing the browser is fine.

But if you are accepting session cookies then you are accepting cookies. These regulations don't differentiate between different types of cookies, all are treated equally. So you disabling 3rd party cookies and concluding that all cookies are not essential is a false conclusion.

Let's get this clear. I am not interested in third party advertising. I sell some software on websites with no advertising, so my motives are quite pure.

You can assert that cookies are not essential as much as you like. But try disabling cookies (all cookies, not just 3rd party cookies) and see if you can use Facebook or Google Mail.

corbyboy

closed wrote: »

Cookies aren't essential to view a bit of html, neither are all the other invasive tracking methods used across the net. The fact so many sites force them upon us, well before any login or shopping takes place, is because they can, not because they need to, inorder to make a site function.

Personally I don't have a problem with being tracked across the web, but I totally understand why people might not be comfortable with it.

But the fact is that a lot of websites are supported by advertising. If there is going to be an advert on a website, why not make it a more relevant one? It's not like they are selling your personal details to the advertisers. It's just an automated system that is able to look at where you have been.

Compare this to, for example, the Tesco Clubcard. The amount of data they have on you is incredible. Does an automated advertising system that knows which websites you have been to really seem so scary compared to that?

closed

Cookies are the tip of an iceberg, but at least someone is trying to bring some control to privacy on the web. Nobody reads or understands privacy policies when they browse or sign up to a website.

If people were given the option when they first launch a web browser, and every year thereafter:

Do you want to be tracked by various anonymous corporations while your browse the web

Do you want your geolocation reported to websites.

Do you want to be served up adverts, while you browse.

Do you want google to know just about everything you do on the web

Do you want google to go through your personal emails, and serve up you ads based on their content.

Do you want lots of information collated about you to be held in databases outside your control?

Do you mind if all the information above is capable of being linked together, and possibly leaked to the world?

Do you want your web experience to be slower than it needs to be, because of all this going on in the background?

How many would really say, go ahead, yes please (outside social network users who don't care or don't understand the potential consequences)

It's very similar to junk mail, and phone calls, nobody really wants any of it, but you have to jump hoops to stop it, and it still doesn't stop completely.


A significant percentage would probably decline.

The default to all these things should be opt out, it's not, and to obstruct or disable most of this tracking is not at all straightforward. If 3rd party add-ins can do it, it can be built in to the browser. Every browser should have one big prominent privacy button, which once hit will block all tracking - websites would have to recode for these people, and drop their analytics, to avoid losing visitors.

The how to pay for the web is a different issue, a significant percentage of the websites out there should be able to allocate a budget for it, as they make money in other ways, and wouldn't make as much without a website. A world without adverts of any kind would be a nicer place imo, and goods would be cheaper.

Tesco don't know what people are thinking, just what they may eat/buy from their stores along with times etc. Any supermarket could implement something similar by using credit card or debit cards details.

Dave_C_2

corbyboy wrote: »

You can assert that cookies are not essential as much as you like. But try disabling cookies (all cookies, not just 3rd party cookies) and see if you can use Facebook or Google Mail.

Facebook and Google mail the last two two bastions against the invasion of privacy:(. The words "seive" and "leaky" spring to mind.

Dave

Dussed

I do web dev in my spare time, and in all my experiences with making scripts like user systems etc, I've been told to stay away from cookies because they are a pain and can easily be "insecure". In my scripts mostly everything is remembered in MySQL, so if I can work it this way, (and I'm only 17), why can't big companies?

A._Badger

The supermarket clubcard is, as Closed says, a red herring. First, it's a specifically opt-in system, second, the user gets a very tangible benefit (cash) and third, knowing which brand of toilet paper you buy (and even how often) isn't quite in the same invasive league as keeping score on which political sites you read and when.

yangptangkipperbang

corbyboy wrote: »

So you disabling 3rd party cookies and concluding that all cookies are not essential is a false conclusion.

Let's get this clear. I am not interested in third party advertising. I sell some software on websites with no advertising, so my motives are quite pure.

You can assert that cookies are not essential as much as you like. But try disabling cookies (all cookies, not just 3rd party cookies) and see if you can use Facebook or Google Mail.

Cookies are "essential" on many websites for the sole reason that the site designers have made them that way.
I don't use Facebook or Google Mail - wonder why ?

Suppose every car had its electrical system designed so that the engine/vehicle would only function if the radio was turned on. The designers could then claim that a radio was an essential item in a car - this has as much truth as saying that cookies are essential.

You may not be interested in 3rd party advertising but that is where all the effort put into cookies is aimed.

corbyboy

Dave_C wrote: »

Facebook and Google mail the last two two bastions against the invasion of privacy:(. The words "seive" and "leaky" spring to mind.

Here's a few more that don't work without cookies:

• BBC iD (https://id.bbc.co.uk/)
• Twitter
• Amazon
• Tesco
• Halifax Online Banking
• Hotmail

As I said before. Rejecting third party or persistent cookies is fine. But short term sessions cookies are essential for any kind of login system.

Dussed wrote: »

I do web dev in my spare time, and in all my experiences with making scripts like user systems etc, I've been told to stay away from cookies because they are a pain and can easily be "insecure". In my scripts mostly everything is remembered in MySQL, so if I can work it this way, (and I'm only 17), why can't big companies?

Can you let me know how you create a (secure) login system that doesn't use cookies? By the way, I don't regard appending the session ID to the URL as secure.

yangptangkipperbang wrote: »

Suppose every car had its electrical system designed so that the engine/vehicle would only function if the radio was turned on. The designers could then claim that a radio was an essential item in a car - this has as much truth as saying that cookies are essential.

In that case can you please explain to me how to code a secure login system that doesn't require cookies. I would love to know.

Pugwash69

yangptangkipperbang wrote: »

Cookies are NOT essential ! They [STRIKE]are[/STRIKE] were a useful addition to the web BUT have now become little more than a pain in the posterior. There original purpose has been hijacked for a number of purposes - mainly advertising.

Have a look at the cookies that THIS web site has given you.
7 of them are there so that this bulletin board works better.
4 of them are used by google so that MSE can find out where all of their advertising effort goes.
1 of them I haven't a clue.

You could argue that the first 7 are not essential, but then you would not be logged-in and posting here.