19 September 2024 Emily Salamon
Journal of Experiences
The role of analytics cookies in web data analysis, between understanding users and respecting privacy
In the rapidly evolving digital world, data analysis has become essential to understand and improve our online experience and in this process, analytics cookies play a crucial role, because they provide valuable information on people’s behavior on the web. However, with the growing awareness on the issue of privacy, it is essential to find a balance between collecting useful data and respecting individual rights.
Analytics cookies: essential tools for understanding users
Cookies, which are small text files stored on users’ devices, have come a long way since their invention in the 1990s. Initially used to maintain session status, they now play a fundamental role in web data analysis. With the advent of data analysis, analytics cookies have become indispensable tools for collecting aggregate information on people’s behavior and online experience.
These cookies allow us to closely observe how people interact with websites, providing valuable insights into browsing patterns, preferences and habits. This evolution reflects the desire to create more personalized and intuitive online experiences, with a view to facilitating the evolution and improvement of people’s experiences.
Analytics cookies are essential in the process of listening and interpreting the needs of people online as they collect anonymous data such as:
- the pages visited
- time spent on the site
- the navigation routes
- the devices used
This information allows brands and website owners to better understand their audience and optimize their digital experiences. As the TSW manifesto points out, in fact, “People express at any moment in time what they wish, live, fear. Listening is enough.” and analytics cookies are a powerful tool in this digital listening process.
The privacy challenge in using cookies
While analytics cookies offer significant benefits for data analysis, they also raise important privacy issues as people become increasingly aware and concerned about how their data is being collected and used online.
Privacy regulations, such as the GDPR in Europe, have posed new challenges for the use of cookies as they require transparency and explicit user consent for data collection, placing an emphasis on respecting individual privacy.
To address these challenges, it is essential that data managers adopt an approach that balances the need for data collection with respect for the privacy of their audiences. In this sense, the mandatory requirements are:
- Be transparent about the information you collect: clearly communicate what data is collected and how it is used
- Give users control over their data: provide simple options to manage cookie preferences
- Use anonymization techniques: ensure that the data collected cannot be traced back to specific individuals
- Limit collection to strictly necessary data
Towards an ethical and user-friendly data analysis
The future of web analytics is moving towards a more ethical and user-centric approach: the goal, in fact, is to create a digital ecosystem in which data analytics not only respects users’ privacy but also actively contributes to improving their online experience.
On the horizon, in fact, new technologies and methodologies are emerging to balance the need for data with respect for privacy, including:
1 – Cookie-less tracking: techniques that do not require the use of traditional cookies
2 – Aggregate data analysis: focus on general trends rather than individual behaviors
3 – Ethical AI: using machine learning algorithms to analyze data more efficiently and privacy-friendly
4 – Privacy by design: incorporating data protection principles into the early design stages of websites and applications
Additionally, a new paradigm of “data minimization” is emerging, which encourages companies to collect only essential data to improve the user experience. This approach not only respects people’s privacy, but also helps companies focus on the data that is truly relevant to their decisions.
Adopting these ethical practices in data analytics not only addresses privacy concerns, but also helps build trust with the people who interact with brands on their online channels every day.