This policy explains what is stored in your browser when you read insidebulgaria.com, why it is stored, who stores it, and how you can manage your choice at any time.
1. What cookies are
Cookies are small text files a site leaves on your device so that it recognises the device the next time a page loads. They are not programs, they cannot read your other files and they carry no viruses — all they do is remember something between two visits to the site.
Browsers also offer local storage. It works the same way, except the data stays in the browser instead of travelling to the server with every request. This policy covers both, because in both cases something is written to your device.
2. Who sets cookies on this site
Some of them we set ourselves, as the owner of the site — 3 Ways ЕООД. They never leave insidebulgaria.com and are not shared with anyone.
The rest are set by Google, whenever we load one of its services into a page: Google Analytics for statistics, and Google Maps for the maps on place pages. In those cases your browser connects directly to Google, which receives your IP address along with data about your device and browser. That information never reaches us and we do not store it.
3. What cookies we use
3.1. Necessary
Without these the site cannot work, so they always load and we do not ask for consent. They help the page render correctly, remember your cookie choice so you are not asked on every visit, and let the site’s own editors sign in to the admin. An ordinary reader never receives the last of those — the site has no registration, no profiles and no comments.
“My list” belongs here too: the articles you save are kept in your own browser’s local storage. They are never sent to us, there is no account behind them and they are not linked to you in any way. That is also why the list does not follow you from your phone to your computer, and why it disappears if you clear the site’s data.
3.2. Statistics
We use Google Analytics to know how many people read the site, which articles they look for and where readers come from. These cookies tell one visitor from another and keep the state of the current visit, so that several pages opened in a row count as one reading session rather than several separate ones.
Statistics tell us what to write more of and what is not working. We do not use them to identify you as a particular person. Without your consent these scripts do not load and no request goes to Google.
3.3. Maps and embedded content
Place pages show a Google Maps map, and some of them the reviews for the place as well. Google sets a cookie of its own the moment the map loads; it holds display preferences and Google may also use it for its advertising purposes.
Without consent no map is loaded: a button stands in its place and the content arrives only if you press it. Reviews work the same way and appear only after an explicit press.
3.4. What we do not use
- Ad networks, banners, remarketing and profiling for advertising.
- Social network scripts. The share buttons are plain links, and the networks learn anything only once you press one of them.
- External fonts. Fonts are served from our own server rather than someone else’s, so merely opening a page sends nothing outward.
- Cookies for registration, profiles or comments, none of which the site has.
4. The basis on which we set them
Necessary cookies are set because without them the service you asked for cannot be delivered to you.
Everything else — statistics and maps — loads only after your consent, given in the banner on your first visit. Consent is voluntary, it is not a condition of reading the site, and it can be withdrawn at any time just as easily as it was given.
5. How to manage your choice
Whatever you chose in the banner can be changed at any time from the panel below:
The cookie settings button at the foot of the site does the same. Withdrawal applies going forward — it stops the services from loading in future, but it does not delete cookies Google has already set.
Every browser also lets you block or delete cookies yourself, usually under the privacy settings or through the site information next to the address bar. Bear in mind that deleting them also removes “My list” and your cookie choice, so the banner will appear again on your next visit. Blocking all cookies may break the site.
6. Passing data to third parties
When you accept statistics or maps, the data about your visit is processed by Google under its own rules. There is more about them in Google’s privacy policy and in its description of how Google uses cookies.
We do not sell data and we do not pass it to advertisers.
7. How long they are kept
The period depends on what a cookie is for. Your cookie choice is kept for one year, so that you are not asked every time you open the site. Statistics cookies live for up to two years, and the ones Google sets along with the maps for up to six months. Some of the necessary ones expire the moment you close your browser.
8. Changes to this policy
If we add a service that stores something in your browser, we will update this page before that service goes live. What personal data we process, on what legal basis and what rights you have is set out in the Privacy Policy.
Questions on the subject are welcome at privacy@insidebulgaria.com.