All website owners, regardless of whether they are private individuals, corporations, government entities, or private companies, must adhere to the new guidelines issued by the Privacy Guarantor.
Indeed, even websites that are no longer actively used and may not have been updated for months or even years are still subject to the guidelines issued by the Privacy Guarantor.
What are the substantive changes ?
In compliance with the GDPR principles, particularly privacy by design, the website will no longer pre-install cookies other than technical ones. Consequently, all profiling cookies must be preemptively blocked and activated solely upon explicit user consent.
Changes also affect the method of obtaining consent, prohibiting passive actions like mouse scrolling. Instead, consent must be expressly given, either through actions like "Accept All" or granularly, allowing users to approve or reject individual cookies rather than broad categories like "statistics" or "marketing." This customization feature ensures users can tailor their preferences. Automatic actions apply when users select "Accept All" or "Reject All."
Moreover, users must have the ability to modify their consent preferences at any time.
What are profiling and/or third-party cookies?
Profiling cookies are designed to track specific individuals, actions, or behavior patterns. They are frequently employed by platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn, and Google for marketing purposes, enabling the measurement of key performance indicators (KPIs) in paid campaigns.
Even seemingly innocuous tools like chat services, messaging platforms, and maps can collect user data. Regardless of the tool's nature, explicit user consent is required.
Activating these cookies without permission violates regulations.
How should the banner be made?
The banner should be appropriately sized for the visitor's device and should not obstruct navigation (avoiding a 'cookie wall').
It should include:
-a link to extended disclosures
-options to accept, customize, or reject cookie
-an 'X' in the upper right corner to close the banner and express refusal to install profiling and/or third-party cookies.
Is a cookie preference log necessary ?
A cookie preference log isn't necessary. But first, what's a registry? It's a tool to:
-record information sequentially
-retain it for a set period
Regarding cookies, the Guarantor states that the choice must be stored, but a record of these consents is not required.
Regarding cookies, the authority stipulates storing user choices, yet logging consents isn't mandated. Notably, consent requests shouldn't recur within six months.
What risks do I face ?
The risks are significant, with penalties reaching up to €20 million or 4% of turnover if higher, particularly for unlawful data transfers or defying the authority's orders.
Compliance is complex, with seemingly legitimate solutions often proving illicit and costly, leading to inadvertent non-compliance despite efforts to adhere to regulations.
How can you help me be compliant ?
We have made a WordPress plugin, My Agile Privacy, that can be used to be adherent with respect to the new compliances.
These are the main features:
- It was created specifically for the European regulation
- It's hosted on your website, so you have no cost for page views
- It is customizable according to your needs
- It already has a cookie list, which can be extended on demand and also independently
- You can change the default posted disclosures to suit your needs or those of your Privacy Consultant
- Has dedicated support that responds in 24/48 hours
- It has already been installed on over thousands websites and has been extensively tested in various use cases, including E-Commerce
We invite you to consult our website and test the solution directly on the website you are visiting.
"It sounds interesting, but how does your Plugin work as far as the preference log is concerned ?"
Our plugin tracks the user's choices, identifying them via a technical cookie. These choices will remain in memory for six months from the date of first access or in any case from the date of the last update of the choices made by the user: after which they will be deleted. No historical record will be kept of choices made and later changed. It is therefore a snapshot of the user's choices, without any historicity.
We know that there is a lot of confusion on this issue, and we hope to have provided clarity on this point.
If you have any further questions, please contact us.
Where can I purchase your software ?
If you own your own website, you can purchase My Agile Privacy here.
If, on the other hand, you are a reseller, such as a Web agency or Privacy Consultant, you can visit the page dedicated to you.
