What are cookies?

Cookies are small text files which are downloaded to your computer or mobile device when you visit a website or application. Your web browser (such as Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox or Google Chrome) then sends these cookies back to the website or application on each subsequent visit so that they can recognise you and remember things like personalised details or user preferences.

Cookies are very useful and do lots of different jobs which help to make your experience on websites as smooth as possible. For example, they let you move between web pages efficiently, remembering your preferences, and generally improving your experience (see below for more examples). They can also help to ensure that adverts you see online are more relevant to you and your interests.

They are referred to as session or persistent cookies, depending on how long they are used:

• Session cookies only last for your online session and disappear from your computer or device when you close your browser.
• Persistent cookies stay on your computer or device after the browser has been closed and last for the period of time specified in the cookie. These persistent cookies are activated each time you visit the site where the cookie was generated.

Cookie	Name	Purpose	More information
Google Analytics	_utma, _utmb _utmc, _utmz	These cookies are used to collect information about how visitors use our site. We use the information to compile reports and to help us improve the site. The cookies collect information in an anonymous form, including the number of visitors to the	Click here for an overview of privacy at Google
Content Management System cookie	ASP.NET_SessionId	This cookie is set by our content management system on a small number of browsers, upon arrival to the our site. It is not used by the us for any purpose.	Visit the Microsoft website

How to control your cookies

Please remember that we do not use cookies to collect personally identifiable information about you although, as explained above, we may combine information from your registration with the data we get from the web analytics services we use and their cookies (or similar technologies) to analyse how you and other people use our website in detail. These cookies are set to improve your experience on our websites and to enable you to benefit from specific features and to set preferences.

However, there are various ways that you can control and manage your cookies which are discussed in a bit more detail below. Please remember that any settings you change will not just affect our cookies. These changes will apply to all websites that you visit (unless you choose to block cookies from particular sites).

Managing cookies in your browser

Most modern browsers will allow you to:

• See what cookies you've got and delete them on an individual basis.
• Block third party cookies.
• Block cookies from particular sites.
• Block all cookies from being set.
• Delete all cookies when you close your browser.

You should be aware that any preferences will be lost if you delete cookies. Ironically, this includes where you have opted out from cookies, as this requires an opt-out cookie to be set. Also, if you block cookies completely many websites will not work properly and some functionality on these websites will not work at all. We do not recommend turning cookies off when using our Digital Products and Services for these reasons.

If you are primarily concerned about third party cookies generated by advertisers, you can turn these off separately. This is discussed in more detail below.

The links below take you to the ‘Help' sections for each of the major browsers so that you can find out more about how to manage your cookies.

Internet Explorer

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/196955

Firefox

http://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/Cookies

Google Chrome

http://support.google.com/chrome/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=95647

Opera

http://www.opera.com/browser/tutorials/security/privacy/

Safari

http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?path=Safari/5.0/en/9277.html

Safari iOS

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1677

Android

http://support.google.com/mobile/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=169022

Blackberry

http://docs.blackberry.com/en/smartphone_users/deliverables/32004/Turn_off_cookies_in_the_browser_60_1072866_11.jsp

Windows Phone

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsphone/en-us/howto/wp7/web/changing-privacy-and-other-browser-settings.aspx

Managing analytics cookies

It is possible to opt out of having your anonymised browsing activity within websites recorded by analytics cookies. Channel 4 uses the following analytics providers and you can opt out of their cookies by clicking on the following links. Please note that this will take you to the relevant third party's website and generate a ‘no thanks' cookie, which will stop any further cookies being set by those third parties.

Don't forget that by not allowing analytics cookies, this stops us from being able to learn what people like or don't like about our Digital Products and Services so that we can make them better.

Google Analytics

http://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout