Google AdSense and Cookies (Cookie Law) email

EU Cookies

[Badger37]

Hi all,
I've just received an email from Google regarding AdSense and Cookies.
Cookie Law came in a couple of years ago and seems mostly to be a waste or time and just another irritation to website visitors. I was hoping that it would quietly go away!

The email from Google reads as if you now have to implement a 'consent mechanism' if you have already - are other people receiving these emails and what are peoples views (especially if they are in the UK like me).

I've put the Google email text below.
Thanks.



Google Ads Policy Team
Dear Publisher,

We want to let you know about a new policy about obtaining EU end-users’ consent that reflects regulatory and best practice guidance. It clarifies your duty to obtain end-user consent when you use products like Google AdSense, DoubleClick for Publishers and DoubleClick Ad Exchange.

Please review our new EU user consent policy as soon as possible. This requires that you obtain EU end users’ consent to the storing and accessing of cookies and other information, and to the data collection, sharing and usage that takes place when you use Google products. It does not affect any provisions on data ownership in your contract.

Please ensure that you comply with this policy as soon as possible, and not later than 30 September 2015.

If your site or app does not have a compliant consent mechanism, you should implement one now. To make this process easier for you, we have compiled some helpful resources at cookiechoices.org.

This policy change is being made in response to best practice and regulatory requirements issued by the European data protection authorities. These requirements are reflected in changes that have been recently made on Google’s own websites.
Thank you in advance for your understanding and cooperation.
Regards,
The Google Policy Team

[Badger37]

FWIW
Using Silktide's solution I've just found that old pages using QuirksMode or similar ancient DOCTYPEs don't play nicely for IE8 visitors!

FF/Chrome still display the banner - I'm hoping Google are happy with that as they are also dropping IE8 support on many if it's products...

Spent way too much time on Cookie Law for the return I get on my sites... :(

[envintus]

Like I said I wrote this in a short amount of time. A user here on WebmasterWorld saw this thread and has since submitted a pull request on Github with some nice feature enhancements. I've since merged their changes and the latest version is now at 1.1: [github.com...]

The misspelled variable for expiration has also been fixed.

[vordmeister]

What happened with IE8 @Badger37? Just no display or something more horrid? It does take a bit of time especially when you find sites you wrote 12 years ago that make no use of includes. I found it very much easier to remove Adsense from those sites rather than rewrite the architecture in a more sensible way.

Thanks for the update @envintus. Please keep updating us here - it is your very helpful code I have used (with a little mod to add path=/ to the cookie).

[londrum]

yeah, thanks for the script. i think i'll probably end up using it to

[Badger37]

What happened with IE8 @Badger37? Just no display or something more horrid? It does take a bit of time especially when you find sites you wrote 12 years ago that make no use of includes. I found it very much easier to remove Adsense from those sites rather than rewrite the architecture in a more sensible way.

In IE8 my very old pages give a JS error for the cookie banner: "Object doesn't support this property or method". The original page still displays, just the required cookie notice doesn't make it...

There are going to be a LOT of old pages displaying AdSense out there that won't easily accept these modern type banners :(

I notice Cookiebot by Cybot (£3-£25 a month...!) which is another one linked to by Google's cookiechoices site, fails in IE8 with a JS error! - and that's on its own current website pages not old ancient one's I'm playing with. So I'm taking that as a good thing and Google won't worry about old browsers having issues displaying the warning. Not quite what the EU might be expecting though.

More worryingly Cybot have this on their website:
If you use any of Google's embedded services on your website, like AdSense, Analytics, Maps, YouTube and Tag Manager, you must obtain cookie consent from visitors before enabling the services.

If that proves to be the case then it will cause lots of problems.

Silktide seem to be keeping pretty quiet about the whole thing. I did eventually get a late response from their Twitter feed where I was asking if v2 of the script was compliant or if it had to be the more complicated v1. Not a straight answer though. "Might depend on your country" I said UK, but nothing back.

I wish Google would be more vocal on all of this! :(

[londrum]

How do you go about setting the path in the javascript cookie so it applies to the whole website rather than just a subdirectory? I am no good at javascript and the relevant line in the code builds the information in a way that is too clever for me.

this was happening to me as well, so i changed the line

document.cookie = cookie + "=" + value + "; " + expires;

to

document.cookie = cookie + "=" + value + "; " + expires + "; path=/";

[dolcevita]

More worryingly Cybot have this on their website:

If you use any of Google's embedded services on your website, like AdSense, Analytics, Maps, YouTube and Tag Manager, you must obtain cookie consent from visitors before enabling the services.

If that proves to be the case then it will cause lots of problems.

From [adexchanger.com...] :

A Google spokesperson said its policy does not specify if publishers need to obtain consent before dropping cookies.

[bhukkel]

I think there are two things

1 - being compliant with Google Adsense policy
2 - being compliant with EU Cookie law (in practice there are 25 cookie laws for every country one)

This thread is about being compliant with Google Adsense. So based on what i have read having a banner and some kind of cookie policy is enough for Google.

Being compliant for EU cookie law specially in countries like France, Germany and the Netherlands means placing no tracking/ad cookies before you have permission or implied consent. In practice it would be something like on first page view no tracking/ad cookies and on the second page view you can start placing all cookies.

[robzilla]

Being compliant for EU cookie law specially in countries like France, Germany and the Netherlands means placing no tracking/ad cookies before you have permission or implied consent. In practice it would be something like on first page view no tracking/ad cookies and on the second page view you can start placing all cookies.

Or a cookie wall. That's what most larger sites in The Netherlands have opted for after being threatened with hefty fines.

[dolcevita]

Or a cookie wall. That's what most larger sites in The Netherlands have opted for after being threatened with hefty fines.

I think that probably 75% website with .nl extension did not have implemented any cookie message at all. Second there is very large TV commercial site which do not use cookie wall (only warning in footer) and in the same time use Adsense without waiting on visitor consent.

[rtl.nl...]

And according to their cookie policy which is made working with OPTA (Autoriteit Consument & Mark) there is not any problem at all.

[robzilla]

If their cookie policy is as outdated as the OPTA they refer to -- it's called ACM these days -- that doesn't bode well for them. The sites I was referring to had similar cookie notifications, but were still considered in violation, so RTL is, too. But you're right in saying that most sites are.

[dolcevita]

RTL4 is very big player in NL (with TV and news) and i can hardly believe that they did use outdated policy,

Another examle nos.nl ( Dutch Broadcast Foundation with three Dutch public television channels and radio which do not use wall cookie warning and place 2 cookie before visitor consent.)

And the last example with with wall cookie warning is telegraaf.nl. You just consent to visit content but
they too place one cookie before visitor consent at all.

[bhukkel]

@dolcevita

You can place functional cookies without permission..so the number of cookies set before consent is not leading..it is more where are the cookies used for.

[dolcevita]

Thank you for bhukkel for correction.

Anyway i would just to point that on of the biggest player in Netherlands commercial world such an RTL4 TV do exactly same what many of us should do. Place cookie warning message in footer and display Google content before visitor consent. I believe that Google will be also happy with such a way of cookie EU policy.

[Badger37]

...and another thing :)

Looking at Google's cookiechoices.org website using 'The Way Back Machine' I see Google used to be more helpful and provided their own script for people to use! I'm not sure why they would remove it and just link to other 'vendors'?

cookiechoices.js is the script they used to document and is still being used by their blogger sites which have all started to display a large banner if you are in the EU.

"We offer two basic tools for websites. The first tool will create a splash screen, which you may wish to use for your landing page. The second tool can be used to overlay a notification bar on your landing page. If you decide that a splash screen or a notification bar are the right approach for your site, you are welcome to use the tools provided here."

I've just grabbed a copy from a blogger site to play with to see if it suits me.

[ivok]

Is there any Privacy page template so that we can use the text in it and put in our own Privacy page?

[robzach]

May I show cookie consent on EU visitors only? Planning to use maxmind country targetting tool.

[thms]

So are we still allowed to place the cookie on the first page load, before the user has chosen to accept the cookie policy?

I was thinking about this, what if your cookie widget links to your privacy/cookie policy page and on that page, you inform the user how to delete the cookies your site just placed if they don't agree with your cookie policy? It's a PITA, nobody will read that but at least it is compliant with the strictest rules because you can prove that technically a cookie is of no use if it's deleted on the next page load and this next page doesn't access the cookie information.

[jpch]

Is there any Privacy page template so that we can use the text in it and put in our own Privacy page?

There's an Italian company called iubenda that creates a privacy policy for your site. It's not a free service but it's also not that expensive. They have also implemented a cookie solution which you can see at the top of their page:

[iubenda.com...]

[Badger37]

May I show cookie consent on EU visitors only? Planning to use maxmind country targetting tool.

Yes I believe so - take a look at Google's 'blogger' platform, that's what they are doing.