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Cookies.
Cookies are small text files that a website stores in the visitor's browser so it can recognise them on later visits — for a login, a shopping basket or a language setting, or for measurement and advertising by services such as Google Analytics or Meta.
Cookies — Explained in Detail
The web has no memory of its own: to the server, every page request is a new, independent request. Cookies create that memory. The website sets a cookie with a name, a value and an expiry, and the browser sends it back with every further request. That is how you stay logged in, how the basket stays full and how your chosen language is remembered.
Cookies are classified by origin and purpose. First-party cookies are set by the website you are visiting; third-party cookies come from embedded services such as ad networks or video platforms. Session cookies disappear when the browser closes; persistent cookies remain until their expiry date. By purpose there are strictly necessary cookies (login, basket, security), preference cookies, analytics cookies and marketing cookies, which track users across websites.
In Switzerland, Art. 45c of the Telecommunications Act (FMG) requires that users are informed about the use of cookies and their purpose, and told how they can refuse them. This can be done in the privacy policy; an opt-in banner is not mandatory in every case. Anyone addressing visitors from the EU, however, falls under the stricter rules of the GDPR and the ePrivacy requirements, which demand prior consent for non-essential cookies. Many Swiss websites therefore use a consent banner.
Technically, the trend is moving away from cookies for measurement and advertising. Browsers such as Safari and Firefox have blocked third-party cookies for years, and many visitors decline them. If you still want to measure your website, you increasingly rely on privacy-friendly statistics without cookies — see cookieless tracking — and on first-party data. How consent is obtained on a website is explained under cookie banner.
Example: a cookie inventory for an SME website
A dental practice believes its website sets no cookies. A check shows otherwise: the embedded YouTube video, the Google map, an analytics script and a chat widget together set more than twenty cookies, some from third parties, before anyone has clicked anything. The fix: the video and map load only after a click, statistics run cookie-free, and the chat widget is removed. The privacy policy then describes what actually happens.
Building websites that collect as little data as possible is part of our web development. The obligations around the imprint, privacy policy and cookie banner are summarised with sources in a German-language article in our magazine on imprint, data protection and cookie banners.
Related Page
Cookieless TrackingIn-depth on the blog
Impressum, Datenschutz, Cookie-Banner: PflichtenFrequently Asked Questions About Cookies
Not necessarily. The Telecommunications Act requires information about cookies and a way to refuse them; this can also be provided in the privacy policy. If you address visitors from the EU or use marketing cookies, you will usually need a consent solution. If in doubt, have it checked by a legal professional.
Cookies without which a function the visitor explicitly uses would not work — such as login, shopping basket, security features or the stored cookie choice itself. Analytics and advertising cookies are not among them.
You are logged out of websites, baskets and settings are lost, and stored consents have to be given again. The websites themselves continue to work normally afterwards.
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