Progress Update
Building on our initial findings, we have made some improvements to the cookie banner.
Tiers
Speaking with multiple privacy SME’s we have identified three tiers of privacy settings:
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Tier 1: Light (gives users the minimum amount of control)
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Tier 2: Medium (must get the user’s consent before you setting any cookies that are not strictly necessary)
It also highlighted the need for a heavier tier for GDPR and CCPA compliance, especially for agencies interacting with European organisations.
- Tier 3: Strong for sites that comply with GDPR regulations (must get the user’s consent before you set any cookies that are not strictly necessary.)
Design
Button placement
Since we need to display multiple buttons and the width is based on the button text (not fixed), we have moved them to the bottom - under the banner text. They now display horizontally along the bottom of the screen, allowing for a wider range of use cases while maintaining their form.
Banner placement
At the moment especially given the importance of accessibility the consensus is that the banner would appear relative as the first element on the page. Even though we found that around 80% of the banners were fixed to the screen, we didn’t want to run the risk of obstructing any content, and disrupting the reading order for users who rely on tabbing to navigate the page. Part of we also looked at other UI elements such as the Global Alert, which could potentially be displayed at the same time, in the same position so we considered the display priority and other potential conflicts, such as micro-interactions and color use.
Example with ‘Global alert’:
Secondary confirmation notice
We will not be including the secondary confirmation notice at this stage as our research indicates that this strength of privacy in not needed in our context.
Cookie page guidance
Additionally, following best practices for managing settings, we assume there is a need to include a separate cookies page next to the privacy page. This would provide information on how cookies are being used, what cookies are being stored, and allow users to manage their settings. As part of the component guidelines, we would include a separate cookie guidance page on how to write a cookies page.
Next steps
We will be further evaluating the cookies guidance page.
In the meantime, your feedback is greatly appreciated and will help identify any additional areas of improvement. Please let us know what you like about it, what you would change or any other suggestions you may have.