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You can just set your browser not to send whichever cookies you don't want to. Cookies are a client-side technology. Why does the government need to be involv

You can just set your browser not to send whichever cookies you don't want to. Cookies are a client-side technology. Why does the government need to be involved?

webstrand 11mo ago
Not all cookies are bad for the user, for instance the one that keeps you logged in or stores the session id. Those kind were never banned in the first place. Blocking cookies locally doesn't allow you to easily discriminate between tracking and functional cookies. And even if the browser had a UI for accepting or rejecting each cookie, they're not named such that a normal user could figure out which are important for not breaking the website, and which are just for tracking purposes. By passing a law that says "website providers must disambiguate" this situation can be improved.
- youngtaff 11mo ago
  Cookies that keep you logged in or maintain a session don’t need consent
  - webstrand 11mo ago
    Blocking cookies client side will block all cookies regardless of value. Hence the usefullness of law to disambiguate.
layer8 11mo ago
The website wouldn’t inform you about which cookies are doing what. You wouldn’t have a basis to decide on which cookies you want because they are useful versus which you don’t because they track you. You also wouldn’t be informed when functional cookies suddenly turn into tracking cookies a week later. The whole point of the consent popups is to inform the user about what is going on. Without legislation, you wouldn’t get that information.
stavros 11mo ago
Because it's not like the browser has two thousand cookies per website, it only has one and then they share your data with the two thousand partners server-side. The government absolutely needs to be involved.
- immibis 11mo ago
  Actually it often is a separate cookie per tracker because that's convenient for the trackers. But the only reason they don't put in the effort to do it the way you said is that browsers don't have the feature to block individual cookies. If they did, they would.
  - 1718627440 11mo ago
    Some browsers like Midori do the sensible thing and ask you for every cookie, whether you actually want to have it. Cookie dialogs are then entirely redundant. You can click accept all in the website, and reject all in the browser.
    - immibis 11mo ago
      Which is presumably the reason nobody uses Midori
      - 1718627440 11mo ago
        I liked it. The reason I don't use it is because it doesn't support modern JS heavy websites.
- AnthonyMouse 11mo ago
  To begin with that isn't true, because the worst offenders are third party cookies, since they can track the user between websites, but then you can block them independently of the first party cookies. Then you have the problem that if they are using a single cookie, you now can't block it because you need it to be set so it stops showing you the damn cookie banner every time, but meanwhile there is no good way for the user or the government to be able to tell what they're doing with the data on the back end anyway. So now you have to let them set the cookie and hope they're not breaking a law where it's hard to detect violations, instead of blocking the cookie on every site where it has no apparent utility to you. But the real question is, why does this have anything to do with cookies to begin with? If you want to ban data sharing or whatever then who cares whether it involves cookies or not? If they set a cookie and sell your data that's bad but if they're fingerprinting your browser and do it then it's all good? Sometimes laws are dumb simply because the people drafting them were bad at it.
rebolek 11mo ago
Of course, let ME decide if I want to keep fdfhfiudva=dsaafndsafndsoai and remove cindijcasndiuv=fwíáqfewjfoi. I know best what those cookies do!
eitau_1 11mo ago
If there's no regulation, nothing stops a website from telling hundreds of third-party entities about your visit. No amount of fiddling with browser settings and extensions will prevent a keen website operator from contributing to tracking you (at least on ip/household level) by colluding with data brokers via the back-end.
troupo 11mo ago
Because it's not about cookies. Ad trackers shouldn't store my precise geolocation for 12 years for example: https://x.com/dmitriid/status/1817122117093056541 https://x.com/dmitriid/status/1817122117093056541

You can just set your browser not to send whichever cookies you don't want to. Cookies are a client-side technology. Why does the government need to be involved?

webstrand 11mo ago

Not all cookies are bad for the user, for instance the one that keeps you logged in or stores the session id. Those kind were never banned in the first place. Blocking cookies locally doesn't allow you to easily discriminate between tracking and functional cookies. And even if the browser had a UI for accepting or rejecting each cookie, they're not named such that a normal user could figure out which are important for not breaking the website, and which are just for tracking purposes. By passing a law that says "website providers must disambiguate" this situation can be improved.

youngtaff 11mo ago
Cookies that keep you logged in or maintain a session don’t need consent
- webstrand 11mo ago
  Blocking cookies client side will block all cookies regardless of value. Hence the usefullness of law to disambiguate.

layer8 11mo ago

The website wouldn’t inform you about which cookies are doing what. You wouldn’t have a basis to decide on which cookies you want because they are useful versus which you don’t because they track you. You also wouldn’t be informed when functional cookies suddenly turn into tracking cookies a week later. The whole point of the consent popups is to inform the user about what is going on. Without legislation, you wouldn’t get that information.

stavros 11mo ago

Because it's not like the browser has two thousand cookies per website, it only has one and then they share your data with the two thousand partners server-side. The government absolutely needs to be involved.

immibis 11mo ago
Actually it often is a separate cookie per tracker because that's convenient for the trackers. But the only reason they don't put in the effort to do it the way you said is that browsers don't have the feature to block individual cookies. If they did, they would.
- 1718627440 11mo ago
  Some browsers like Midori do the sensible thing and ask you for every cookie, whether you actually want to have it. Cookie dialogs are then entirely redundant. You can click accept all in the website, and reject all in the browser.
  - immibis 11mo ago
    Which is presumably the reason nobody uses Midori
    - 1718627440 11mo ago
      I liked it. The reason I don't use it is because it doesn't support modern JS heavy websites.
AnthonyMouse 11mo ago
To begin with that isn't true, because the worst offenders are third party cookies, since they can track the user between websites, but then you can block them independently of the first party cookies. Then you have the problem that if they are using a single cookie, you now can't block it because you need it to be set so it stops showing you the damn cookie banner every time, but meanwhile there is no good way for the user or the government to be able to tell what they're doing with the data on the back end anyway. So now you have to let them set the cookie and hope they're not breaking a law where it's hard to detect violations, instead of blocking the cookie on every site where it has no apparent utility to you. But the real question is, why does this have anything to do with cookies to begin with? If you want to ban data sharing or whatever then who cares whether it involves cookies or not? If they set a cookie and sell your data that's bad but if they're fingerprinting your browser and do it then it's all good? Sometimes laws are dumb simply because the people drafting them were bad at it.

rebolek 11mo ago

Of course, let ME decide if I want to keep fdfhfiudva=dsaafndsafndsoai and remove cindijcasndiuv=fwíáqfewjfoi. I know best what those cookies do!

eitau_1 11mo ago

If there's no regulation, nothing stops a website from telling hundreds of third-party entities about your visit. No amount of fiddling with browser settings and extensions will prevent a keen website operator from contributing to tracking you (at least on ip/household level) by colluding with data brokers via the back-end.

troupo 11mo ago

Because it's not about cookies. Ad trackers shouldn't store my precise geolocation for 12 years for example: https://x.com/dmitriid/status/1817122117093056541 https://x.com/dmitriid/status/1817122117093056541