Policy

Cookie Policy

This Cookie Policy explains what cookies and similar technologies Essencyclopedia uses, why they are used, and how visitors can manage them. It reflects the current use of first-party measurement and Google Analytics 4, while also making space for advertising, embedded media, and affiliate relationships.

Short version: Essencyclopedia uses strictly necessary technologies and optional analytics. Google Analytics 4 loads only after you allow the Analytics category. Advertising, embedded YouTube media, and affiliate tracking remain separate optional categories.

Your Current Choice

Necessary Always on

Analytics Off

Advertising Off

External Media Off

Marketing and Affiliate Tracking Off

You can change these choices any time through the Cookie Preferences control in the footer.

What cookies and similar technologies are

Cookies are small text files stored on your device when you visit a website. Similar technologies can include local storage, security tokens, embedded media storage, or other browser-side identifiers that help a website remember state, keep a session secure, measure usage, or load external services.

Some of these technologies are strictly necessary for a website to function. Others support measurement, advertising, media embeds, or partner attribution and should be handled more carefully.

How Essencyclopedia organizes consent

Essencyclopedia uses the following consent categories as its long-term structure:

Necessary

Required for secure site operation, session state, form protection, and sign-in verification.

Analytics

Used to understand which pages are visited, how readers arrive, and how the site performs.

Advertising

Reserved for Google advertising, ad measurement, and related consent signals when advertising is enabled.

External Media

Reserved for embedded media such as YouTube videos or other third-party players.

Marketing and Affiliate Tracking

Reserved for partner attribution or affiliate tools that introduce non-essential tracking technologies.

Cookies and technologies currently used on the site

Essencyclopedia uses necessary technologies, first-party analytics, and Google Analytics 4 when the Analytics category is allowed. The list below focuses on the cookies and similar storage currently relevant to site operation.

Name Category Purpose Typical duration

essencyclopedia-session Necessary Keeps the Laravel session working for forms, internal tools, sign-in state, and other secure session-based functionality. Session-based or until timeout

XSRF-TOKEN Necessary Helps protect forms and state-changing requests against cross-site request forgery. Short-lived / session-related

ec_vid Analytics Stores a pseudonymous first-party visitor identifier used by Essencyclopedia's own audience measurement system. Up to 2 years

_ga and _ga_E20SPYXZEK Analytics Google Analytics 4 cookies used to distinguish visits and measure how the site is used. They are set only after the Analytics category is allowed. Up to 2 years

g_csrf_token Necessary Used only when Google sign-in is involved to verify the integrity of the sign-in request. Short-lived

What analytics measure

Essencyclopedia uses its own first-party analytics and, where you allow it, Google Analytics 4 to understand how the site is being used. This measurement is focused on site performance, content usefulness, and high-level traffic patterns rather than on building a named reader profile.

Depending on the request and your chosen analytics setting, this measurement can include:

the page path and route visited;
the content type and content slug;
the referrer host or source URL;
campaign parameters such as utm_source, utm_medium, and utm_campaign;
device type, browser family, and operating system family;
country-level geography when available from infrastructure headers;
a pseudonymous session hash and pseudonymous visitor hash;
an anonymized IP representation instead of a full analytics-facing IP record.

Analytics boundaries

No city-level tracking is intentionally stored in the current analytics UI.
Essencyclopedia does not use its own analytics layer to create a cross-site advertising profile.
No visitor data is sold by Essencyclopedia.

Advertising, embedded media, and affiliate tools

Essencyclopedia plans to leave room for additional tools later, but they should not be treated as part of the necessary layer.

If and when these features are enabled, they will be handled under separate categories:

Google Ads / AdSense: will fall under Advertising.
Embedded YouTube videos: will fall under External Media.
Affiliate tools that introduce partner tracking technologies: will fall under Marketing and Affiliate Tracking.

That means these tools should not be merged into the necessary category simply because they are useful to the site owner. If they rely on non-essential storage or third-party tracking, they should be disclosed and handled through user choice where legally required.

How newsletter and contact data fit into this

The newsletter form and contact form involve data processing, but they are not mainly cookie categories in themselves. If a reader subscribes to the newsletter or submits a contact message, the information entered into the form is handled under the broader Privacy Policy rather than treated as a standalone cookie category.

How to manage choices

As Essencyclopedia's consent interface is expanded, readers should be able to:

accept all optional categories;
reject non-essential categories;
open a preferences center and change choices later;
see embedded media placeholders instead of auto-loaded third-party players where appropriate.

You can revisit cookie choices through the Cookie Preferences control in the footer. As the stack grows, that preferences layer should stay aligned with the actual technologies in use instead of becoming a decorative banner with outdated settings behind it.

Changes to this policy

This policy may be updated as Essencyclopedia adds advertising, external embeds, affiliate tools, or a more complete consent-management interface. When the technology stack changes in a meaningful way, the cookie descriptions and category mapping should be updated to match it.

Contact

If you have questions about cookies, tracking, or data use on Essencyclopedia, use the contact form.