Why Toxic Cookies Are Killing Your Reputation

Oracle and Salesforce have a cookie problem. The two companies were recently hit with GDPR class-action lawsuits over cookie-tracking consent. They are not the only businesses experiencing legal heartburn from how they manage cookies. Consumer privacy regulation around the world ranging from GDPR to Schrems II is getting more complicated and difficult for businesses to follow. Legislators are getting more aggressive about enforcing this legislation. As a result, more businesses are getting hit with fines and damage to their reputations for failing to adhere to laws governing cookie management.

EU member states and countries of the EEA area have received a total of €60.1 million in fines for GDPR violations in 2020 alone, with the most prominent reason behind the breaches being an insufficient legal basis for data processing.

Why Businesses Are Struggling with Cookie Management

So what’s the problem? Businesses are not maliciously trying to skirt privacy laws – they’re confused and exhausted. They’re confused by the myriad elements of cookie management regulations, and they’re exhausted by the effort to keep up with them. Any business that has customers in the EU must take a proactive approach to managing consumer consent for placing cookies on their websites – not just once but often. For, instance, under GDRP law, businesses:

• Cannot load cookies on their site until a site visitor says, “I consent.”

• Need to maintain a record of the actual date and time that consent was made.

• Must make it easy for a visitor to withdraw consent.

• Must make prominent a “decline cookies” option.

Effective cookie management is not easy. It looks something like this:

But how many sites do these things? Not enough. So it’s not surprising that businesses such as Vueling Airlines in Spain are paying fines for inadequate cookie management. We’ve noticed also that some of the leading providers in cookie management software are in breach of privacy regulations. What’s a business to do? We have a solution.

Investis Digital Cookie Manager 2.0

As a provider of digital communications, Investis Digital works in a highly regulated landscape. We host more than 2,000 websites. For that reason, we work with clients to ensure that they are meeting the latest regulatory requirements and respecting privacy. Based on our experience, we’ve launched a solution, Cookie Manager 2.0, that does all the heavy lifting for our clients’ cookie management.

Cookie Manager 2.0 represents a major upgrade to a product we’ve been using for the past 18 months across hundreds of websites. The upgrade centers on new features and performance changes to better reflect the new normal of cookie handling and data privacy management.

The current product in place for most of our clients has served its purpose well. We’re making it stronger to reflect the ever-evolving compliance laws that compel people to make conscious choices when engaging with a website, and that compel businesses to respond to those choices. We’re already deploying the product, too.

As with the first iteration, Cookie Manager 2.0 handles all aspects of clients’ cookie management needs – and by all, we mean everything from scanning a client’s website to identify all cookies that are loading to recording cookie consent to handling the withdrawal of consent. Here’s snapshot of the ground we cover with Cookie Manager 2.0:

Bottom line: Our clients don’t have to worry about cookie compliance. We have you covered.

Contact Investis Digital

We urge all businesses to take ownership of cookie management. And if you need a partner, contact us. Learn more about our technology solutions here.