Browser cookies are files created by a website that contain small amounts of data and are sent between a sender and a receiver. On the Internet, the sender would be the server where the web is hosted, while the receiver would be the browser used to visit the Internet pages.
What are cookies for?
Cookies are used above all to identify the user by storing their activity history on a specific web page, so that the most appropriate content can be provided according to habits.
This will mean that when you visit a website for the first time, a cookie will be saved in the browser with information. When the same page is visited again, the server requests the same cookie to fix the configuration and make the user's visit as personalized as possible.
These cookies can be of great value to know when the Internet user last visited a page or the items saved in the shopping cart in a E-commerce, an activity that is stored in real time.
Instead of using the website's server, where cookies are stored is in the receiver's file. The first cookie was created in 1994 by a Netscape Communications worker.
Types of cookies
There are different kinds of cookies, but below we show you which are the most frequent:
- Session cookies: they have a very short life span, which are deleted when the browser is closed.
- Persistent cookies or persistent cookies: they are used to track the user by storing information about their behavior on an Internet page for a specific period of time. Clearing the browser data can be erased.
- Secure cookies or secure cookies: they are used only in https connections. They keep information encrypted to prevent the collected data from being vulnerable to malicious attacks.
- Zombie cookies: the browser has no power over them as they continue to regenerate even once deleted. They are stored on the device and not the browser.