Because the banners were not necessary (companies could just, you know, not set all those tracking cookies!) They were a petulant response to EU legislation, l

Because the banners were not necessary (companies could just, you know, not set all those tracking cookies!) They were a petulant response to EU legislation, like a little child told to clean his room who goes around stomping their feet, sighting very loudly, slamming drawers, and doing the bare minimum they think will satisfy what they were told to do (ie everything just gets shoved into closet shelves and drawers) etc. The point of the banners are to annoy the shit out of everyone in hopes that we'll pressure elected officials to pass some legislation they write up that undoes the privacy protections. "See? See what that legislation your silly elected officials made us do? Isn't it annoying? We told you...but we wrote up some new legislation, you should tell them to pass it." The nice side benefit is that they're extra annoying to people who have cookies blocked entirely, or dumping cookies after each browser quit, etc.