Marketers slam looming cookie law

Some 82% of digital marketers think the EU cookie law is ‘bad’
for the web, while many are still struggling to work out how to implement it despite the final deadline being only weeks
away.
According to a recent poll of 700 marketers by Econsultancy, the EU e-Privacy Directive – enforceable in the UK on May 26 following 12 months’ grace – remains a thorn in their side, with just 18% believing it is a positive development.
One respondent said: “While I’m all for protecting privacy, the bit of this directive that applies to cookies has been ill thought out and even more badly applied, by someone who doesn’t understand the technology. Rather than try and analyse what cookies are actually intrusive, they’ve just ‘banned’ the lot! The lack of advice or guidance from the EU or Government has made things worse.”
Another respondent wrote: “There’s total confusion on how to apply it and what it should be applied. There are a few nice implementations, nothing which everyone agrees on which means a disjointed user experience from site to site.”
Some 57% of respondents have read the e-Privacy Directive, while 67% say they are aware of the May 26 UK deadline.
But the guidance from the Information Commissioner’s Office has left marketers unsure of how to tackle the change and was described by one respondent as “fluffy at best and sometimes contradictory”. Some 54% of respondents said their companies have carried out a cookie audit in preparation for the deadline.
Respondents voiced a lack of consumer awareness of what cookies are and what they mean around the EU Cookie law. Only 7% of respondents think that users will understand what cookies are.
Econsultancy chief executive Ashley Friedlein said: “We created this poll to gauge industry sentiment and understanding of the EU cookie law. A surprisingly high percentage of respondents know about the Directive, have read it, read the ICO guidance and done a cookie audit. Despite this, almost everyone thinks it lacks focus and web users don’t care about cookies and won’t understand the changes. The feeling is there is not enough clarity on what cookies are ‘strictly necessary’ and much less clarity on how to implement consent/opt-in.”

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