Cookie Policy
When users enter the Scottish Government blogs their computers will automatically be issued with ‘cookies’. Cookies are text files which identify users’ computers to the Scottish Government’s server. The website then creates ‘session’ cookies to store some of the preferences of users moving around the website, e.g. retaining a text-only preference.
Cookies in themselves do not identify individual users but identify only the computer used. Scottish Government session cookies are deleted on departure from the website. However, those from third parties may persist.
Many websites use cookies to track traffic flows, whenever users visit those websites.
| Cookie | Expiry Period | Description |
| __atuvc | 20/06/2019 | This cookie is associated with the AddThis social sharing widget which is commonly embedded in websites to enable visitors to share content with a range of networking and sharing platforms. It stores an updated page share count. |
| __atuvs | N/A | This cookie is associated with the AddThis social sharing widget which is commonly embedded in websites to enable visitors to share content with a range of networking and sharing platforms. This is believed to be a new cookie from AddThis which is not yet documented, but has been categorised on the assumption it serves a similar purpose to other cookies set by the service.
The main purpose of this cookie is: Functionality |
| _ga | 20/06/2019 | This cookie name is asssociated with Google Universal Analytics – which is a significant update to Google’s more commonly used analytics service. This cookie is used to distinguish unique users by assigning a randomly generated number as a client identifier. It is included in each page request in a site and used to calculate visitor, session and campaign data for the sites analytics reports. By default it is set to expire after 2 years, although this is customisable by website owners.
The main purpose of this cookie is: Performance |
| _gid | N/A | This cookie name is asssociated with Google Universal Analytics. This appears to be a new cookie and as of Spring 2017 no information is available from Google. It appears to store and update a unique value for each page visited.
The main purpose of this cookie is: Performance |
The Scottish Government blogs uses cookies to measure use of the website including number of visitors, how frequently pages are viewed, and the city and country of origin of users. This helps to determine what is popular and can influence future content and development. For this purpose, the Government uses web analytics to measure and analyse usage of the blogs. The information collected by the Scottish Government will include IP Address, pages visited, browser type and operating system. The data will not be used to identify any user personally.
Most modern web browsers allow users to control cookies through the browser settings. To find out more about cookies, including how to see what cookies have been set and how to manage and delete them, visit www.aboutcookies.org or www.allaboutcookies.org.
Log files stored on the Government’s web server allow the recording and analysis of users’ use of the website. Log files do not contain any personal information.