How Browser Cookies Helps You and What Are They For?

April 20, 2019
Updated on August 20, 2021

Juan Abreu Rodríguez

Author

A browser cookie is a file generated by a website that contains small amounts of data that is sent between a browser and a website. In the case of the Internet, the sender would be the server where the web page would be hosted, and the receiver is the browser that you use to visit any web page.

Its main purpose is to identify the user by storing their activity history on a specific website so that they can offer the most appropriate content according to their habits. This means that each time a website would be visited for the first time, a cookie would be saved in the browser with information. Then, when the user access to the same website again, the server asks for the same cookie to make the configuration of the site and make the visit of the user as personalized as possible.

Continue reading to understand how this works.

What is the idea of the browser cookies?

The common use of cookies is to identify yourself on a website. Users would be identified by entering their credentials on a validation page; cookies allow the server to know that the user would be already validated and therefore can be allowed to access services or perform operations that are restricted to unidentified users.

Other websites use cookies to customize their appearance according to the user’s preferences. Sites that require identification often offer this feature, although it is also present in others that do not require it. Personalization includes both presentation and functionality. For example, Wikipedia pages allow identified users to choose a presentation style to their liking; The Google search engine allows users (even unregistered users) to decide how many search results they want to see on each page.

Also, websites use HTTP cookies to streamline your web experiences. Without cookies, you’d have to log-in again after you leave a site or rebuild your shopping cart if you accidentally close the page. Making cookies an important a part of the internet experience (Kaspersky, 2021).

There are websites that use cookies to collect information so they can offer publicity related to your searches.

Did you remember looking for a product and in some websites appears advertisements for the same product category?
This works because cookies allow the detection of pages visited by the user in a specific site or group of sites to make the experience as personalized as possible, but in some cases can be scary, right?

According to a European Union report on data protection that analyzed close to 500 web pages, 70% of cookies are third-party cookies and track our activity to offer personalized advertising.

Types of browser cookies

First Party Cookies: With this, the websites will be able to remember your preferences such as menu settings, themes, language selection, and internal bookmarks between sessions. With first-party cookies, you can make those selections on your first visit, and they will be consistent until the cookie expires (Price, 2018).
Third-party cookies: they are own when the cookies would be managed from the terminal or domain of the same publisher. Third party, when not sent by the publisher, but by another entity. First-party cookies also play an important role in user authentication. If you were to disable them, you would need to re-enter your login credentials every time you visited a page (Price, 2018).
Session and persistent cookies: in session cookies, the data collected is only collected while the user is browsing the website. In the case of persistent data, the data would be still stored in the terminal and can be accessed for a certain period of time.

Technical cookies for personalization, analysis, and advertising: technical cookies would be those that control traffic and data communication; those for personalization, those that leave the user’s access according to some own characteristics that are collected (browser, language, etc.). The analysis data collect data on the behavior of users and allow to develop a user profile. Finally, advertising companies collect data on the management of advertising spaces.

Wrong ideas of web browser cookies

Cookies are not similar to worms and viruses, that can erase data from users computers.
Cookies are not a type of spyware, so they cannot read personal information stored on user’s computers.
Cookies do not generate pop-up windows.

Cookies are not harmful; they don’t carry viruses or malware, and they don’t store personal information about you. But some websites may not be secure, which can allow hackers to intercept cookies and abuse the information they carry (Vasic, 2021).

Actually, cookies are only data, not code, then they cannot erase or read information from users computers. However, cookies permit the detection of pages visited by a user in a particular site or group of sites. This information can be collected in a user profile. These profiles are usually anonymous, so they do not contain the user’s personal information (name, address, etc.). In fact, they can not contain it unless the user has communicated it to one of the visited sites. But although anonymous, these profiles have been the subject of some concerns regarding privacy.

Cookies common problems.

Despite the benefits of cookies in browsers, they can also be harmful if not used correctly. Below is a list of the most common problems:

People share computers and devices:

Any device that is shared in a public area, and several computers used in an office environment or in a house, are used and shared by many people. Let’s say you use a public computer (in a bookstore, a cybercafe, etc.) to compare something from an online store. This store will leave a cookie on the computer, and someone may later try to buy something in the store using your account. The stores on the Internet usually give great notices about this problem so that care is taken in making purchases from certain places, even so, there may be mistakes. To check if someone has visited a site on a public machine before you, you can check it by viewing the history of the URLs, which will show a list of visits to that site.

Some websites notify the users about the uses of browser’s cookies, other websites force us to accept them in order to continue using the service – that is why they are obliged to inform us about the cookies, although there are ways to deactivate and block them.

Multiple devices

People often use more than one computer during the day. For example, I have a computer in the office, a computer at home, my phone and also an Ipad. Unless the site would be specifically engineered to solve the problem, I will have like 4 or more unique cookie files on all the devices. Any site that I visit from all the devices will track me as a different user. It can be annoying to set preferences with all the devices. Again, a site that allows registration and stores preferences centrally may make it easy for me to have the same account on all of them, but the site developers must plan for this when designing the site. If you visit the history URL demonstrated in the previous section from one machine and then try it again from another, you will find that your history lists are different. This is because the server created two IDs for you, one on each device.

If you do not want data about you to be stored on computers, you can delete them in different ways depending on the browser. Here is list of step on how to delete the website cookies in different browsers:

Google:

On your computer, open Chrome.
At the top right, click More or the 3 dots icon.
Click More tools and then Clear browsing data.
At the top, choose a time range. To delete everything, select All time or the option need it.
Next to “Cookies and other site data” and “Cached images and files,” check the boxes.
Click on Clear data.

Edge:

On your computer, open Edge.
At the top right, click the Hub icon (three horizontal lines at the top bar in front of a star).
Select the History menu option.
Click Clear history.
Check the following boxes: “Cookies and saved website data” and “Cached data and files”.
Click on Clear.

Mozilla FireFox:

On your computer, open Mozilla FireFox.
Click on the menu button in the upper right corner.
Select Options.
In the Privacy section, click on Clear your recent history.
From the drop-down menu next to Time range to clear, select Everything you need.
Click on Clear Now.

Safari on your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch:

On your device, go to settings.
Tab on Safari.
Tab on advanced.
Tab on Website Data.
Tab Remove All Website Data.

As we have seen as users, we need to understand how the cookies work to protect our information in different devices, we can know if the website is using cookies when a notification appears explaining the use of cookies, also when the website has a car to store items, is common to uses cookies to make this features work or more information can be found in the privacy policy of the website.

Web Browser’s Cookies are very important tools for website development because they are great data matrix with information about users. Thanks to them, we can also improve the user experience in our web service or direct advertising to a specific group of potential clients.