Cookies
Cookies are small text files that are placed on your computer or mobile device by the websites that you visit.
Cookies are widely used in order to make websites work more efficiently, and/or enhance the user experience, as well as providing information to the owners of the site (i.e. for making customer-focused improvements to the site).
The law that applies to how cookies are used for storing information on your equipment (such as your computer or mobile device) changed on 26 May 2011.
The following information covers how our sites use cookies, and how to disable them if you wish.
If you disable cookies, it may prevent you from using some of the features on our websites (e.g. completing some of our online forms), or it may prevent us from collecting enough data to identify where we need to improve our site (e.g. Google Analytics).
We do not collect personal information through cookies.
Any information we collect via cookies is used anonymously, simply to improve our online services and enhance your experience of our websites. We will not use the information to identify individuals or share it with anyone else.
To find out more about cookies, including how to see what cookies have been set on your computer or mobile device, and how to manage and delete them, visit www.aboutcookies.org.
See the table below for more information about our use of cookies at Norfolk County Council.
| Cookie(s) | Where it is used |
Why it is used | More information and how to block |
|---|---|---|---|
| Session based cookies for online forms (.NET) |
Main website (online forms) |
These cookies are essential for our online forms and adult learning online enrolments to operate. They are set upon your arrival to the site. These cookies are deleted when you close your internet browser. |
To ensure these cookies are not placed on your computer, we recommend that you disable cookies directly within your browser. Blocking these cookies will mean you will not be able to use these online forms or the Adult education online enrolment function. |
| Cookies for Firmstep forms | Main website (online forms) |
These cookies are essential for our online forms: AWSELB - "Amazon Web Services Elastic Load Balancer" - Used to direct your request to the appropriate server. No personal information is contained or used firmstep2server - Used to direct your request to the appropriate server. No personal information is stored. firmstep2session and ASP.NET_SessionId - A unique identifier given to you for the duration of your site visit. It is used to ensure that you and only you are shown information relevant to you. It contains no personally identifiable information, but is temporarily linked to your Forms account when you log in (if you use one). |
To ensure these cookies are not placed on your computer, we recommend that you disable cookies directly within your browser.
Blocking these cookies will mean you will not be able to use these online forms |
| Norfolk Electronic Library Online PC Booking Service (provided by Insight Media Internet Limited [iCAM]) | Norfolk Electronic Library Online PC Booking Service |
This cookie tracks the user’s session allowing them to use the service. There is no user data stored in this cookie. |
To ensure this cookie is not placed on your computer, we recommend that youdisable cookies directly within your browser. Blocking cookies from this service will stop you using this website and the service. |
| Library Catalogue | Online Library Catalogue |
The online catalogue uses session cookies to maintain the users current session. This cookie holds absolutely no sensitive or personal information about you or your computer. The catalogue also uses Google Analytics cookies to evaluate usage of the site. |
To ensure this cookie is not placed on your computer, we recommend that you disable cookies directly within your browser. Blocking cookies from this service will stop you using this website and the service. |
| Google Analytics cookies |
These cookies are used to collect information about how visitors use our site. We use the information to analyse the customer journey and help us improve the site. The cookies collect information in an anonymous form, including the number of visitors to the site, where visitors have come to the site from and the pages they have visited. |
To ensure this cookie is not placed on your computer, we recommend that you disable cookies directly within your browser. Blocking cookies from this service will not stop you using our website, but we will be unable to capture information about your experience online and make improvements. Click here for more cookies information from Google Click here to opt out of being tracked by Google Analytics across all websites |
|
| SiteImprove Analytics cookies | Main website |
These cookies are used to collect information about how visitors use our site. We use the information to analyse the customer journey and help us improve the site. The cookies collect information in an anonymous form, including the number of visitors to the site, where visitors have come to the site from and the pages they have visited. |
To ensure this cookie is not placed on your computer, we recommend that you disable cookies directly within your browser. Blocking cookies from this service will not stop you using our website, but we will be unable to capture information about your experience online and make improvements. |
| Text-to-speech tool (Readspeaker) | Main website | If you wish to save your preferred settings (e.g. speed) then it will use a cookie to keep these settings as you browse the site with Readspeaker turned on. |
To ensure this cookie is not placed on your computer, we recommend that you disable cookies directly within your browser. Blocking the Readspeaker cookie will not stop you using our website, but may prevent you from getting the best experience of the text-to-speech tool. |
| YouTube cookies | Main website | We embed YouTube videos on our website. If you play an embedded video, YouTube will place a cookie on your computer. |
To ensure this cookie is not placed on your computer, we recommend that you disable cookies directly within your browser. Blocking YouTube cookies will not stop you using our website, but may prevent videos from playing properly. |
| Facebook Pixel cookies | Main website |
We use Facebook Pixel to track our marketing campaigns. Facebook Pixel enables us to target relevant Facebook adverts at groups of people who have visited or interacted with certain pages on our website. It also helps us to measure how effective our Facebook adverts are. We cannot identify individual visitors to our web pages by using Facebook Pixel. |
To ensure this cookie is not placed on your computer, we recommend that you disable cookies directly within your browser. Find out how to set your advert preferences in Facebook. |
| Twitter cookies | Main website |
We embed Twitter feeds on our website. If you click through to Twitter's website, it may use both session cookies and persistent cookies to better understand how you interact with the service. |
To ensure this cookie is not placed on your computer, we recommend that you disable cookies directly within your browser. Blocking Twitter cookies will not stop you using our website or viewing our tweets. |
| Text Size Cookies |
Adult education enrolment site 2nd air memorial library website Norfolk County Council ezine – eg Your Norfolk |
This cookie is used to remember the font size settings you have selected for the site. This is not essential, as users can alter the text size in their browsers. |
To ensure this cookie is not placed on your computer, we recommend that you disable cookies directly within your browser. Blocking these cookies will not stop you using our website. We may shortly consider removing this feature, as text size can be controlled by the user from the browser. |
| Sitecore cookies | Main website and my.norfolk.gov.uk | These cookies help us deliver personalised content to you and provide anonymous reports to us on how visitors use our site. |
To ensure this cookie is not placed on your computer, we recommend that you disable cookies directly within your browser. Blocking cookies from this service will not stop you using our website. |
| Asp.Net cookies | Main website and my.norfolk.gov.uk | ASP.NET_SessionID cookie is used to keep a status of your session as soon as you visit the website. | A SessionID cookie is required should you wish to login to the website. |
| Norfolk Heritage Explorer cookies | Norfolk Heritage Explorer website | The max/min cookies are used to remember the extent of the last map viewed by the user, so that when they return to the map using the “BACK” button their view is retained. These are not essential. | To ensure this cookie is not placed on your computer, we recommend that you disable cookies directly within your browser. |
| Online poll cookies | Norfolk County Council ezine – eg Your Norfolk |
Determines whether a customer has participated in an online poll on one of our ezines, to avoid people voting multiple times. |
To ensure this cookie is not placed on your computer, we recommend that you disable cookies directly within your browser. Blocking cookies from this service will not stop you using our ezines. |
| StatCounter statistics cookies |
Norfolk County Council ezine – eg Your Norfolk |
A third party, used to track how many people read the ezines. |
To ensure this cookie is not placed on your computer, we recommend that you disable cookies directly within your browser. Blocking cookies from this service will not stop you using our ezines. |
| Section authorisation cookies |
Norfolk County Council ezine – eg Your Norfolk |
Very occasionally non-public sections or eMagazines are locked and a cookie is used to allow login. |
To ensure this cookie is not placed on your computer, we recommend that you disable cookies directly within your browser. Blocking cookies from this service will not stop you using the vast majority of our ezine content. |
| Instant Atlas server cookies |
Norfolk Insight website |
Remembers which “look and feel” you have applied to the IAS user website (if there is more than one available) Remembers how many items you like to see in a list by default Remembers any choices you have made to increase/decrease the default font size using the buttons in the top right Remembers the choice you made about which locale/language to view the site in (if more than one available) Remembers the choices you made about which themes were expanded in a tree (on a tree by tree basis – different cookies for different trees) The built-in forms authentication cookie for ASP.NET. Used when user logs in. This is an essential cookie for this function. |
To ensure these cookies are not placed on your computer, we recommend that you disable cookies directly within your browser. Blocking cookies from this service will not stop you using the website, but you will be unable to log in and the site will not remember your preferred settings. |
| Click4Assistance |
online web chat (main website) | _C4AP: Used to identify if the visitor is new or returning, includes historic activities such as when/if a chat has started, hotspot hit or conversion occurred. Type/duration: Persistent31/Dec/2030 _C4AS: Used to hold information about the Click4Assistance tools and proactive rules Type/duration: Session |
It is possible to switch off cookies by setting your browser preferences. Turning cookies off may result in a loss of functionality when using any of the Click4Assistance services. |
| Where it is used | Name | Purpose | Data stored by cookie | Duration of cookie | More information |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Managing your current visit | ASP.NET_SessionId | Stores the user's session ID to allow the site to recognise your movement around the site as being from one computer | Information about the user’s current session | Expires at the end of the session (when you close your browser) | Without this cookie, much of the website’s functionality would be impaired, such as searching and filtering results, navigation breadcrumbs, etc |
| Managing your shortlist |
Shortlist |
Records the services the user has added to their shortlist | The IDs of the services in the shortlist | One year | Without this cookie the user would not be able to add services to their shortlist or have them be persisted there between visits to the site |
| Logging in to the Administrative area | sqlAuthCookie | Records that the user has successfully logged into their MarketPlace account | An encrypted authentication key | Expires at the end of the session (when you close your browser). |
Without this cookie the user would not be able to log in to the website |
| Logging in to the public area of the MarketPlace | sqlAuthCookie | Records that the user has successfully logged into their MarketPlace account | An encrypted authentication key | Expires at the end of the session (when you close your browser) | Without this cookie the user would not be able to log in to the website |
| Remembering your search options |
mp-search-… |
Records the user’s advanced search options so that they can be recalled when refining the search or navigating back to the homepage | The search field (encoded in the name of the cookie) and the value chosen |
Expires at the end of the session (when you close your browser) | Without this cookie the user’s advanced search options would not be remembered between page views |
| Text size accessibility widget | TEXT-SIZE | Records the user’s preference of text size so that it is persisted between pages and visits to the site | Small, medium or large | Permanent | Without this cookie the text size will reset with every page visited |
| Social media sharing buttons |
__atuvc, _atshc, _conv_r, _conv_v, bt, bt2, di2, dt, loc, ssc, ssh, sshs, uid, um, uvc | Ensures the user sees the updated count if they share a page and return to it before the button’s share count cache is updated on the server | Information on the share buttons the user has clicked | Up to two years | These cookies are part of a third-party social media widget used by the MarketPlace, produced by a company called AddThis. No data from these cookies are sent back to AddThis and disabling cookies would cause unexpected behaviour for users |
| CQC Widget | ki_s, ki_t, ki_u, duplicates of the Google Analytics cookies (_ga, __utma, __utmz) | The “ki_...” cookies are used by CQC via a third party company called Qualaroo to occasionally offer in-page surveys. See the Google Analytics entry for more details on their purpose, data and duration | The Qualaroo cookies store whether you have been shown a survey already | The Qualaroo cookies last 5 years | |
| Google Translate | googtrans | Records the choice if the user has used the Google Translate widget to change the language of the page | A code representing the language chosen | Expires at the end of the session (when you close your browser) | Without this cookie the translation would be disabled with every page visited |
| Google Analytics | _ga, _utma, _utmb, _utmc, _utmz | Together these cookies record how many people are using the website and how they move around the site once they've arrived. This helps us monitor how the website is used so that we can see where to make improvements and ensure a good service is provided |
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Without these cookies, the user will see no difference in the functionality available to them, but maintenance and support of the site is made more challenging for the Local Authority. See Google’s analytics privacy policy for further information
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