Cookie caveats could cause chaos

The Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) has announced details of how the UK will implement European law concerning privacy and electronic communications.

When companies use cookies, or similar tracking devices, they must inform users and give them a chance to refuse the technology. This could lead to many websites having to be altered.

A DTI spokesman explained that companies would either have to alert visitors about the potential use of cookies on the first page of a site, or direct them to another page where they can agree to, or decline, the use of cookies. "Companies must give users the chance to opt out," he said.

Enforcement would be the responsibility of the Information Commission. Iain Bourne, strategic policy manager at the Commission, suggested that ensuring compliance would be a mammoth task.

"The sheer scale of this presents an enormous problem for us," he said. "There is a basic transparency problem, but we think that if someone uses a cookie [or similar device] that profiles the user, then it is an invasion of privacy. Users should have the right to say no."

The Commission's website provides guidance on the use of cookies, where it warns: "It is important that at least some reference to the use of tracking technology is clearly displayed to all site visitors."

In a study of 170 websites last year, the DTI found that the majority used cookies.

The Commission indicated that all the sites it examined collected at least one item of personal, demographic or sensitive information, yet fewer than half of these sites included an explanation of why this information was being gathered.

It discovered that almost half of the organisations placed a cookie on the user's computer, and in almost one in four of these cases a third party placed a cookie on the user's computer.

Companies already using cookies may find that the government intervention limits the type of services that they can offer to their users.

Andy Kitchener, chief executive at e-business solutions provider Shopcreator, insisted that most businesses use cookies simply to enhance the user's experience and to simplify online processes.

"As a business you are not interested in individual user behaviour, but groups of users," he said.

John Barker, a lawyer at Last Cawthra Feather, said that it was best practice for firms to obtain consent from their users when collecting data, and his company advises its clients to inform users of the presence of cookies.

However, he maintained that any suggestion of businesses devoting a large part of the homepage to an alert message was "unreasonable".

"It distracts from the website," he said. "But it would be a good idea to have a link that explains the use of cookies somewhere on the site."

See also:

Whose PC is it anyway?

Just who owns the software you run on your PC? Spyware and other programs infringe your privacy or restrict what you do, so should we make a stand?  18 Sep 2003

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