A cookie banner is an element by which a website obtains consent for the use of cookies and similar technologies beyond those that are necessary for it to function. For consent to be valid, it must be freely given, informed and demonstrable. In practice this means several requirements. Refusing must be just as easy as accepting, that is, at the first level of the banner, not only after clicking through to settings. The checkboxes for individual categories must not be pre-ticked. The user must know what categories exist and what they are for. Consent must be revocable as easily as it was given, and its granting must be recorded. Scripts that require consent must not run before the user has given it – this is the most common mistake, and one the banner does not visibly cover up.
See also: Consent to data processing, Privacy policy, Data quality in analytics.
