What are cookies?
To make this site simpler, we sometimes place small data files on your computer while you browse. These are known as cookies. Most big websites do this too.
Why use cookies?
Cookies improve things by:
- measuring how you use the website so we can make sure it meets your needs
- remembering settings, so you don’t have to keep re-entering them whenever you visit a new page
- tracking the effectiveness of our content
Our cookies aren’t used to identify you personally. They’re just here to make the site work better for you. Indeed, you can manage and/or delete these small files as you wish.
To learn more about cookies and how to manage them, visit AboutCookies.org. Or please read on to find out more about how and where we use cookies.
How we use cookies
Measuring website usage
We use Google Analytics to collect information about how people use this site. We do this to make sure it’s meeting its users’ needs and to understand how we could do it better.
The cookies collect information such as the number of visitors to the site, which pages you visit, how long you are on the site, how you got here and what you click on. We do not collect or store your personal information (eg your name or address) so this information cannot be used to identify who you are. We do not allow Google to use or share our analytics data.
The following cookies are placed on your computer by Google Analytics:
| Cookie ID | Typical content | Expires | Type | What it does |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| _utma | Randomly generated number | After 2 years | First party | Keeps track of the number of times you visit the site, when your first and last visit occurred |
| _utmb | Randomly generated number | After 30 minutes | First party | Records the time you arrive at the site |
| _utmc | Randomly generated number | As soon as you close your browser window | First party | Records the time you leave the site |
| _utmz | Randomly generated number | After 6 months | First party | Tracks which site you came from, which search engine you used, which link you clicked, which keyword you used, and where in the world you are |
For more information about Google Analytics visit Google Analytics website.
Measuring visitor interaction with our website, and receiving visitor feedback
We use the HotJar platform to ‘heatmap’ which areas of our web pages are most useful and popular to our visitors, and to seek feedback from visitors so that we can best ensure we’re providing for their needs.
The following cookies may be placed on your computer depending on how you interact with our website (see ‘Description’). Read more about how HotJar use cookies.
| Name | Description | Duration |
|---|---|---|
| _hjClosedSurveyInvites | Hotjar cookie. This cookie is set once a visitor interacts with a Survey invitation modal popup. It is used to ensure that the same invite does not re-appear if it has already been shown. | 365 days |
| _hjDonePolls | Hotjar cookie. This cookie is set once a visitor completes a poll using the Feedback Poll widget. It is used to ensure that the same poll does not re-appear if it has already been filled in. | 365 days |
| _hjMinimizedPolls | Hotjar cookie. This cookie is set once a visitor minimizes a Feedback Poll widget. It is used to ensure that the widget stays minimizes when the visitor navigates through your site. | 365 days |
| _hjDoneTestersWidgets | Hotjar cookie. This cookie is set once a visitor submits their information in the Recruit User Testers widget. It is used to ensure that the same form does not re-appear if it has already been filled in. | 365 days |
| _hjIncludedInSample | Hotjar cookie. This session cookie is set to let Hotjar know whether that visitor is included in the sample which is used to generate funnels. | 365 days |
| _hjShownFeedbackMessage | This cookie is set when a visitor minimizes or completes Incoming Feedback. This is done so that the Incoming Feedback will load as minimized immediately if they navigate to another page where it is set to show. | 365 days |
| _hjid | Hotjar cookie. This cookie is set when the customer first lands on a page with the Hotjar script. It is used to persist the Hotjar User ID, unique to that site on the browser. This ensures that behavior in subsequent visits to the same site will be attributed to the same user ID. | 365 days |
| _hjRecordingLastActivity | This should be found in sessionStorage (as opposed to cookies). This gets updated when a visitor recording starts and when data is sent through the WebSocket (the visitor performs an action that Hotjar records). | Session |
| hjTLDTest | When the Hotjar script executes we try to determine the most generic cookie path we should use, instead of the page hostname. This is done so that cookies can be shared across subdomains (where applicable). To determine this, we try to store the _hjTLDTest cookie for different URL substring alternatives until it fails. After this check, the cookie is removed. | Session |
| _hjUserAttributesHash | User Attributes sent through the Hotjar Identify API are cached for the duration of the session in order to know when an attribute has changed and needs to be updated. | Session |
| _hjCachedUserAttributes | This cookie stores User Attributes which are sent through the Hotjar Identify API, whenever the user is not in the sample. These attributes will only be saved if the user interacts with a Hotjar Feedback tool. | Session |
| _hjLocalStorageTest | This cookie is used to check if the Hotjar Tracking Script can use local storage. If it can, a value of 1 is set in this cookie. The data stored in_hjLocalStorageTest has no expiration time, but it is deleted immediately after creating it so the expected storage time is under 100ms. | N/A |
| _hjptid | This cookie is set for logged in users of Hotjar, who have Admin Team Member permissions. It is used during pricing experiments to show the Admin consistent pricing across the site. | Session |
| _hjAbsoluteSessionInProgress | The cookie is set so Hotjar can track the beginning of the user’s journey for a total session count. It does not contain any identifiable information. | 30 minutes |
Logging in - Courtauld staff and students only
The intranet and some pages on the VLE are not publicly viewable, and can only be used by current Courtauld staff and students. As such they require a log-in, which is stored using a cookie on your machine.
The following cookies are placed on your machine to allow you to log-in:
| Cookie ID | Cookie name | Typical content | Expires | Type | What it does |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| MOODLEID_ | Moodle Sign-In | user name | After 2 months | First party | Remembers your VLE username in the browser |
Other third-party cookies
If you already use social media platforms, they might set cookies on your machine as you use our website. Data can then be collected by these companies that enables them to serve up adverts on other sites that they think are relevant to your interests.
Twitter Cookies: ab_sess_search_relevance_ranked_hits_189, dnt, t1, auth_token_session, secure_session, twll, twid, ab_sess_wtf_user_to_user_rec_155, ab_sess_search_relevance_social_167, ab_sess_t1_actions_156, _twitter_sess, _twitter_sess, ab_sess_activity_ddg_126, ab_sess_activity_up_top_98, ab_sess_promoted_arrows_and_pills_78, ab_sess_Relevance_V1-49, _sm_au_d, auth_token, external_referer, guest_id, k, lang, original_referer, pid
Facebook Cookies: lu, L, L, datr, e, c_user, c_user, presence, sct, sct, _sm_au_d, act, _e_bWDI_21, _e_bWDI_22, _e_bWDI_23, _e_bWDI_24, _e_CTMK_0, _e_CTMK_1, _e_CTMK_2, _e_e6Yv_0, _e_e6Yv_1, _e_e6Yv_2, _e_0ITr_10, wd, x-referer, xs, xs, reg_ext_ref, reg_fb_gate, reg_fb_ref, reg_ext_ref, reg_fb_gate, reg_fb_ref
Google Cookies: PP_TOS_ACK, IGTP, NID, ULS, OTZ, APISID, SAPISID, SSID, _sm_au_d, S, S_awfe, SID, SS, W6D, BEAT, HSID, PREF?
Microsoft Cookies: MC1, WT_FPC
Contacting us
If you have any questions or concerns about our use of cookies or our privacy policy, please e-mail us at website@courtauld.ac.uk