Socitm ‘cookies’ audit identifies scale of task for local public sector websites to comply with new legislation
An audit for Socitm of 603 public sector websites, including the main sites of all local authorities and 170 other public service organisations, including fire, police, housing and PTEs has shown that all but six of them have cookies that will require them to take action to comply with the new legislation that came into force on 26 May.
On average each site has 32 cookies with the largest number found on a single site being 1346. Very few sites have no cookies at all. Many sites have cookies set by third party system suppliers and websites such as Twitter and Google made available through the website.
Headline results for all 603 websites tested will be sent out their owners over the next two weeks.
The new cookies legislation, prompted by an EU directive, puts a new compliance burden on all website owners, including public and private sector owners and those responsible for sites that may be delivered by third parties.
The new law requires website owners to provide their visitors with an opportunity to give their consent to having cookies downloaded on to their computers or mobile devices. The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), which is responsible for enforcing the new law in the UK, has allowed all organisations one year to make the necessary changes – although complaints about serious breaches will be investigated during this period.
Simply removing cookies from websites risks compromising usefulness and usability and is not a realistic option for organisations looking to shift more services online. The law makes it clear that website owners must be aware of all cookies on their site, whether set by them, or as is often the case, where they have been set by third parties.
Once cookies have been identified, and evaluated as being necessary for the efficient and effective operation of the website (if not they should be removed), a site owner needs to choose from a range of options for obtaining informed consent from website users. They should also consider if any of the cookies used on their sites fall into the exemption provided by the new regulation, ie if they can be considered strictly necessary for the purpose of a user’s visit to the website.
Thereafter measures need to be put in place for monitoring cookies used on the website. New cookies added to the site need to be flagged for site users and the site needs to be checked regularly for cookies ‘dropped’ by third parties.
In partnership with Cookie Reports Ltd, Socitm Insight has launched a simple and practical service that will enable public sector organisations to respond to this new requirement. The Cookie Management Service has been set up as a shared service with initial funding from Socitm, allowing to be offered to local authorities, police and fire services, housing providers and others at an affordable price. Those organisations signing up to the service get
- a full report detailing all cookies on their website and the pages on which they appear
- a plain English ‘How to’ guide describing options for informing the public about cookies in ways that ensure compliance with the legislation
- a monitoring service, integrated with an ‘active cookies page’ offering visitors information to support informed choice about their continued use of the site
‘It is difficult and time-consuming to identify cookies by manual means and therefore easy to underestimate the scale of the use of cookies websites’, says Martin Greenwood, Programme Director for Socitm Insight. ‘We have compared the number of cookies found by our audit with those declared by some of the organisations that have already taken action on cookies. It is difficult to check for cookies and in every case we have found significantly more cookies that the site owners are aware of.’
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