Cookies

Cookies and Website Traffic Analysis

When users enter the First Minister website their computers will automatically be issued with ‘cookies’. Cookies are text files which identify users’ computers to the First Minister’s server. The website then creates ‘session’ cookies to store some of the preferences of users moving around the website, e.g. retaining a text-only preference.

The First Minister website uses cookies to measure use of the website including number of visitors, how frequently pages are viewed, and the city and country of origin of users. This helps to determine what is popular and can influence future content and development. For this purpose, the Government uses web analytics to measure and analyse usage of the website. The information collected by the Scottish Government will include IP Address, pages visited, browser type and operating system. The data will not be used to identify any user personally.