About Cookies


Cookies are small text files that websites save locally to your computer, which allow sites to store and use information during your visit. They can improve your experience when using a website by:

Remembering preferences, so you don’t have to:

  • keep re-entering your choices when you visit again
  • Measuring how you use a site, so that changes can be made
  • to ensure it meets your needs

None of 'guest' cookies used for our sites can be used to identify you personally. They are just used to help make the site better for you. To learn more about cookies and how to manage them, visit http://aboutcookies.org/. Read on to find out more about how we use cookies.

Running our website – session cookies

Services such as Google Analytics do not collect any personal information, as identified in their privacy policy. Google also offers a browser plugin that allows users to opt out of their analytics.

Our members and session cookies

To run our sites we use “session cookies”. These cookies are used to remember selections and preferences that you’ve already made or information that you’ve already given. Certain parts of our sites will not work if cookies cannot be set (for example if you set your browser to refuse all cookies). You may not be able to log in if you reject cookies.

Social media – third-party cookies

On some of our pages you may find social media buttons to allow users to easily share pages and post them to social networks. These use third party cookies.

How do I manage cookies or turn them off?

You can manage the cookies stored on your computer, or turn them off completely, through your browser settings. Be aware that this may affect your browsing experience or even prevent you from using certain services such as those with a secure login, which require cookies to be set in order to work.

All modern browsers will let you change your cookie settings to give you broad control over whether cookies can be set or not. For more information, visit the help section for the browser you use. Here are a few of the most popular:

Cookie settings in Internet Explorer
Cookie settings in Firefox
Cookie settings in Chrome
Cookie settings in Safari

If you are concerned about third party cookies generated by advertisers, you can visit the Your Online Choices website which allows you to turn these off.

The Network Advertising Initiative also provides opt-out controls for targeted advertising by NAI member ad networks.