3rd party cookies not accepted in IE 7, rumors says

  • Jon Lund 

Well back home in Copenhagen, I still have one more rumor to report from the ICOM conference in Berlin. Sources somewhat close to the release of IE 7 said, that the next version of Internet Explorer browser will by default not accept 3rd party cookies. (Actually the same sources said that had been the plan with IE 6 as well).
Since all site-centric measurement relies on exactly this, a default non-acceptance would pose serious problems to online audience measurement: the only way to tell if two visits to your website is made by the same user or by two different users is through the use of cookies.

0 tanker om “3rd party cookies not accepted in IE 7, rumors says”

  1. Tim B

    Does this mean you can turn on acceptance of 3rd party cookies or that they simply are not allowed altogether? I’m testing a simple HTML page in IE7 Beta wherein I create a cookie and then display it and it is not returning anything for the cookie. I have set the privacy levels to allow all cookies.

    I’d be interested in your insights.
    Thanks.

  2. Oliver Pischke

    Hi Jon,

    you may recall my Name from the sponsor panel during the ICOM. I was present on the stage with Stephan Noller, David Day, Bob Ivans and Richard Wagner. I am still trying to shed some light on the 3rd-party-cookie-issue and will post here as soon as I have the facts.

    Oliver

  4. Jon Lund

    Hi Oliver

    Thanks for commenting.

    What I’ve heard by now – from people having tested the beta of IE 7 – is that some third party cookies are blocked while others are not.

    Though it apparently wasn’t clear what the difference might rely on – it appears to me that someone mentioned that there should go some kind of certificate with the cookie (or from the server from witch the cookie is served), and that this certificate should live up to certain standards

    Best

    Jon

  5. Parker Adams

    I have a cookie-problem with my IE7 “trial software.” Cookies are not working on these sites for me at any cookie-allowing level:

    vvmls.com – I’m a realtor and when I log in, the radius / map search doesn’t work -> this is making finding comps difficult

    melissadata.com, click lookups, ZIP/City/Phone, should produce error.

    Parker

    Also, I cannot look at PDFs anymore. I have to right-click the link and then “save target as” to view them.

  6. Jan Bruun Andersen

    You write: “Since all site-centric measurement relies on exactly this, a default non-acceptance would pose serious problems to online audience measurement:”

    1) I think you are wrong when you say “all site-centric measurement relies on exactly this”.

    If it was truely site-centric, the site would set a 1st party cookie, not a 3rd party cookie.

    3rd party cookies *can* be used in a site-centric-only mode, but they can also be used – and generally are used – to track patters across multiple sites.

    2) Blocking 3rd party cookies may be a serious problem for your industry, but it is a serious privacy benefit for me. Guess which issue carries the biggest weight for me?