What are cookies?

Cookies are small text files which are placed on your computer by websites that you visit. They are widely used to make websites work, or work better, as well as to provide information to the owners of a website. For example, they can help to make sure images appear correctly on your device by storing information about the size of your browser or tell a website operator how well a webpage is performing.

 

A cookie contains an ‘identifier’ (a string of letters and numbers). Cookies may be either ‘persistent’ cookies or ‘session’ cookies. A persistent cookie will be stored by a web browser and will remain valid until its set expiry date or it is deleted by the user before the expiry date. A session cookie will expire at the end of the user session when the web browser is closed.

 

Cookies do not typically contain any information that personally identifies a user, but they can be linked to other personal data stored about you.

 

How we use cookies and your rights

Wales Air Ambulance uses cookies on its website. These cookies are used to enhance the experience of our visitors and to better understand how our website is used and how our advertisements perform. For example, cookies may tell us whether you have visited our site before or if you are a new visitor. Our cookies do not store financial information or information which is capable of directly identifying you (such as your name and address).

 

You have the right to choose whether to accept these cookies. You can exercise this right by amending or setting the controls on your browser to reflect your cookie preferences. However, please note that if you choose to refuse cookies you may not be able to use the full functionality of our website.

 

For more information on cookies and guidance on managing your cookies, please visit the Information Commissioner’s Office website (external link).

 

Cookies that we use

The following cookies are used on our website, as set by our website service provider. These cookies may be stored on your computer when you visit our website.

 

We use Google Analytics to analyse the use of our website. Google Analytics gathers information about website use by means of cookies. This data may be stored outside the EU, protected by model clauses. The information gathered relating to our website is used to create reports about the use of our website. Google’s privacy policy is available at: https://www.google.com/policies/privacy.

 

Cookie Name

Used by

Description

Expiration

__utma

Google Analytics

Stores the amount of visits of a user, the time of their first visit, the previous visit, and the current visit. It does not contain any personal data and is used only for analytical purposes.  

2 years from set/update

__utmz

Google Analytics

This performance cookie stores where a user came from (eg. search engine, search keyword, link).

6 months from set/update

_ga and _gid

Google Analytics

Used to distinguish between website users in Google Analytics.

2 years and 2 hours

_gat_UA-XXXXXXXX-X (where the Xs are replaced by the Google Analytics ID number)

Google Analytics

Used to moderate calls to the Google Analytics service.

1 minute

__unam

ShareThis

Set as part of the ShareThis service and monitors "click-stream" activity, e.g. web pages viewed, navigation from page to page, time spent on each page etc. The ShareThis service only identifies a user if they have separately signed up with ShareThis for a ShareThis account and given them consent. Checks how long you stay on a site: when a visit starts and ends. It does not contain any personal data and is used only for analytical purposes.

14 months

cc_cookie_accept

Website

Stores whether the user has accepted the cookie message or not.

365 days

ASP.NET_SessionId

Website

Used for authenticating a user's session after logging in. Closes when you exit the browser.

End of session

ARRAffinity

Website

Tells our infrastructure which server to handle the request.

End of session

MemberLoggedIn

Website

A binary flag which stores whether a user is logged in or not.

End of session

ai_session and ai_user

Website

Tracks users as they navigate the website predominately for infrastructure performance insights.

1 day

DisplayName

Website

Keeps track of a donors preference to show their name during a Direct Debit.

End of session

IDE,  DSID,

_ct_rmm

Doubleclick.net

These cookies are managed by DoubleClick, an advertising platform we use to display adverts. They help us identify which visitors to our website have seen or clicked one of our adverts.

2 years from set/update

__cfduid

CloudFlare

Identify individual clients behind a shared IP address and apply security settings on a per-client basis

365 days

 

Cookies set by third parties

If you go on to a page on our website which contains embedded content, you may be sent cookies from these websites. For example, clicking on YouTube videos, or using ‘share’ buttons which enable users to easily share webpage content through popular networks such as Facebook and Twitter. These sites may set a cookie when you are logged into their service.

 

We do not control the setting of these cookies, so we suggest you check the third party website for more information about their cookies and how to manage them.