Cookie Law Policy

By using our websites, you are agreeing to the use of cookies as described in detail below.

 

What is a cookie?

A cookie is a small text file (example.txt) that websites send to your ‘terminal equipment’ (e.g. a device such as your computer or smartphone) whenever you visit them. Your internet browser saves these files into your device to recover some information about your preferences or past actions onto that website and reuse them for your next visit – you may be already familiar with some of the of most commonly used internet browsers: Google Chrome, Safari, Internet Explorer, Microsoft Edge, Mozilla Firefox, Brave, etc. 

Cookies perform several functions. A main function is to note down instructions for your internet browser on how to better display a specific website for your future visit. This entails saving some information about your specific device settings. Through these instructions, your internet browser can upload the websites faster and so improve your navigation experience. Another function is to save your details for keeping you logged into online accounts that require authentication – e.g. when you allow your internet browser to remember your log-in details.

Cookies can also communicate back to the website that originally sent them and provide statistical and technical data about your visits. This enables website owners to track and measure traffic on their website – e.g. see which pages are most visited and when as well as some technical data about the visitors.

What we use cookies for

On our website, we use cookies for the following reasons:

  • Functional: our website, like most websites, relies on some functional cookies that are necessary for it to be displayed and work correctly on your device. The data received is related to your visits and mostly technical in nature – e.g. device/browser used, page visited, inputs submitted etc.. Primary functions played by these cookies are to increase the load speed of our website and remember your inputs for specific applications during a live browsing section – e.g. when filling in one of our online forms.
  • Cyber-security: these cookies are sent by third-party web applications which we use to maintain the security and performance of our website. These security applications “challenge” all our visitors with some technical tests to check whether they are all genuine users and so prevent malicious traffic. Whenever a user is recognised as genuine, a cookie is sent for that user to be recognised in the future and be spared of the stress test (which results into faster load time).
  • Social Media Cookies: these cookies are sent by third-party web applications linked to some of the most common social media networks. Some of these help the social networks and us to better understand what content is of interest and what is not. By pressing on the like/sharing buttons on our site or simply navigating through it, you receive cookies that monitor your activity on our website. The privacy implications on this will vary from social network to social network and will depend on the privacy settings you have chosen for your own accounts on those networks.
  • Statistical Analysis: these cookies are sent by third-party web applications which we use to collect web traffic information about the visitors of our website. The cookies collect information in a way that does not directly identify anyone. The data produced is anonymised and mostly quantitative in nature – e.g. the total number of visitors to our website and/or blog, what pages are being visited and for how long, etc.. We use this information to improve our website and measure marketing performance. Our third-party web application for statistical insights is Google Analytics – see Google’s privacy and cookies policies here and read Google’s overview of privacy and safeguarding data here.

You can find more information on cookies on these pages: Aboutcookies.org and Allaboutcookies.org.

How to clear or block cookie download

An easy way to clear your device from any pre-existing cookies is to delete all your browsing history from your internet browser (do not forget to tick on the cookies box when doing so!). 

If you want our cookies to be automatically cleared from your device when visiting our website, you can simply set your internet browser into “private mode” navigation. With this setting turned on, your internet browser will clear your browsing history and cookies at the end of each navigation section.

To permanently block the download of cookies from our website (or any other), you would need to change the settings of your internet browser and enable “block cookie downloads” (via these settings you can opt to do so either for our website only or any other website or even all websites). Beware that with this setting in place some features on our website and others may not function properly.

Via the links below, you can find some more detailed help on how to apply the settings above on Google Chrome:

Via the links below, you can find the instructions on how to apply those settings on some of the other internet browsers (the steps to follow are usually very similar):

To find information relating to any other browser not listed above, please visit the browser developer’s website.

To opt out of being tracked by Google Analytics across all websites, visit: Google Analytics Opt-out Browser Add-on