When you use our websites and apps or interact with our emails, we may collect information using cookies or similar technologies. We may also collect information using your email address. For the purposes of this section, we use the word “cookies” for simplicity.
What are cookies and how do they work?
Cookies are small files that are downloaded to your computer or mobile device when you visit a website. Your browser sends these cookies back to the website every time you visit the site again, so it can recognise you. This allows websites to tailor what you see on the screen.
Do you use other technologies which are similar to cookies?
Yes, we use the following:
Web beacons: Our websites, apps and emails often contain small invisible images known as “web beacons” or “tracking pixels”. These are used in a way similar to cookies to:
understand when a particular part of a webpage, email or app is viewed;
understand how successful an article or an email marketing campaign has been; and
verify any clicks through to links or advertisements contained in emails.
Tracking URLs:
These are web links that allows us to measure when a link is clicked on. They help us measure the effectiveness of campaigns and advertising and the popularity of articles that are read.
Device identifiers:
We use device identifiers on mobile devices in the same way as cookies are used on web browsers. A device identifier is a unique number on your device which allow us to remember your device.
We use these similar technologies on websites, emails and apps, for the same purposes and in much the same way as we use cookies on websites. We shall use “cookies” and “websites” below as shorthand for “cookies and similar technologies” on “websites, emails and in apps”.
What do you use cookies for?
Cookies and other online tracking technologies are an important part of the internet. They make using websites much smoother and affect lots of the useful features of websites.
There are many different uses for cookies, but for within our sites, they fall into the following groups:
Cookies that are needed to provide the service you have asked for (Essential / Strictly Necessary)
Some cookies are essential so you can move around our websites and use their features. Without the use of these cookies parts of our websites would not function.
For example:
Your username and keeping you logged in during your visit – without cookies you might have to log in on every page you go to; and
when you add something to the online shopping basket, cookies make sure it is still there when you get to the checkout.
Cookies that collect information about your choices and preferences (Functional / Preference)
These cookies collect information about your choices and preferences, and allow us to remember things like:
remembering a location you’ve provided us with so we can show you relevant content to where you are and to provide local weather forecasts; if you have filled in a survey, so you’re not asked to do it again; and showing “related article” links that are relevant to the page you are looking at.
Cookies used to understand how people use our products and services (Analytics)
We use analytics cookies to gather information about what pages, links and sections of our apps are popular and which ones do not get used so much to help us keep our sites relevant and up to date. They are also useful to be able to identify trends of how people navigate our sites so we can identify improvements to make to the customer journey.
We may combine information collected by analytics cookies with other information that you provide to us. For instance, if you have registered for an account with us, we may combine your contact details other information you provide us with the browsing history from your device collected by analytics cookies (including data collected from before you registered and when you are signed-out).
We may also use this combined information to improve our products and services. For instance, we may analyse this information in aggregate to improve our advertising systems.
Cookies used to show advertising that is relevant to you (Tracking and Advertising)
Some advertising, known as “online behavioural advertising” is tailored to you and uses information collected by first party and third-party cookies based your web browsing activity.
Cookies are placed on your browser to remember the websites you have visited. Also, when you log into your account, we can recognise your UID. Advertising based on what you have been looking at is then displayed to you when you visit websites who use the same advertising networks.
To help us deliver relevant advertising using cookies, we use Google Marketing Platform. Click here to find out more about Google Marketing Platform.
Additionally, to help us deliver relevant advertising using cookies and track audience conversion, we use Facebook Ads. You can find more information about Facebook Ads here.
We also use these cookies in order to:
know how many advertisements we serve, how many times these are clicked or hovered over with a mouse cursor, how many advertisements we show to a given user and how many customer actions these generate;
understand which customers reach a sale or other action page on an advertiser’s site. This allows us to monitor how many sales or actions we achieve for an advertising client, and therefore, how effective our advertising is; and
protect our advertisers’ brands, we often use a technology that scans the page to ascertain that it is safe from profane, sensitive and potentially brand-negative topics, before serving an ad there. This process is called “ad verification”.
Ad-blockers:
We and our advertisers may use information from within our webpages to determine whether you have an ad-blocker enabled. This information may be stored or associated with your device (including through the use of cookies) to re-insert advertisements on our websites and to understand how our customers use ad-blockers. The advertisements that are re-inserted may include those from ad-blockers’ “white lists” or that promote our own products and services. We reserve the right to restrict your access to some or all of our website while you have an ad blocker turned on.
Do Not Track:
Our websites do not respond to “Do Not Track” browser settings; however, we treat Global Privacy Control signals as an opt-out of selling or sharing of personal information or targeted advertising under the State Privacy Laws.
Managing Cookies:
You can change your cookie settings on this website at any time via your Privacy Settings. Please note that this consent tool is not supported on certain versions of Internet Explorer. Please change your browser in order to exercise your rights under the UK GDPR or the EU GDPR.