Last updated: 5 August 2026.
Quick answer. Tracking cookies are the cookies most closely related to marketing: they track and collect user activity — what you viewed, bought or preferred on a website — together with technical data such as IP address and the time and place of connection. They are often called third-party cookies because they are set by a third party on a website to capture data from its users, which is then used for digitally targeted advertising. The easiest way to monetise them is to allow advertising services to install them on your website, although the return depends on factors such as clicks on the advertisements shown. Under the GDPR this is only lawful with the users’ consent, which must be freely given, informed and specific as defined in Article 4 of the Regulation.
What are tracking cookies?
Tracking cookies are those cookies most closely related to marketing. This is because they are able to track and collect various user activities. This means they can capture what you saw on a website, what you bought there, what your preferences were… And they can also obtain more technical data such as IP address, time and place of connection. These cookies are also often referred to as third party cookies because of their origin. These are the cookies that a third party sets on your website to capture data from your users.
What is its use in marketing?
The data collected through these cookies is used for digital targeted marketing. Basically for showing advertisements according to the preferences of individuals. Third-party cookies actually install a package of data in your browser to track your activity. This tracking, however, is only allowed on those sites that permit the installation of third party cookies. These are used by social networking companies such as Facebook and technology companies such as Google. The easiest way to monetize these cookies is to allow them to be installed on your website by advertising services. These may place advertisements on your website or keep that data for other commercial purposes. However, this does not always imply a return. The benefit you would get would depend on the number of clicks on the advertisement, for example.
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Sanctions of the Data Protection Regulation
Is such use compliant with the RGPD?
The main thing regarding cookies established in the RGPD, is that the consent of the Internet´ users is mandatory . So, if your website has tracking and third party cookies you will need the consent of the users. With that consent, all the necessary data can be collected to segment users. This would be very useful when carrying out different marketing actions according to segments. So the customer who visits your website the most, for example, could be offered a membership for exclusive content. Another way to monetize your website.
Therefore, this monetization will only be possible if the consent is the one in art. 4 RGPD. In other words, it is freely given, informed, specific and unequivocal. Furthermore, such consent can be revoked. This means that if an Internet user of your website subsequently observes a very intrusive advertisement, this could be disabled.
Current situation
However, it should be borne in mind that we are now increasingly focusing on a world without cookies. However, this really refers to a world without third party cookies, because the web’s original cookies will continue to exist. Companies prefer to get their data directly from their customers to do people-based marketing. That is, a car company will get the data of its potential customers from its own website. Therefore, it will not be necessary to obtain them through third party advertising.
Conclusions
The use of cookies for digital marketing is permitted by the RGPD if the consent requirements are fulfilled. So if users of your site consent to the use of tracking cookies may be exploited. You would have to make agreements with the best advertising service and finally trust your users to interact with the ads.
If this article has been of interest, we also suggest you to read the following article published on our website: Data Protection Dictionary (Jargon)
For advice applied to your case, see our Data Protection practice area.
Don’t be left in doubt, get in touch. We’ll be happy to help and offer you solutions.
Frequently asked questions
They are the cookies most closely related to marketing, because they are able to track and collect various user activities: what you saw on a website, what you bought there and what your preferences were. They can also obtain more technical data such as IP address and the time and place of connection.
Because of their origin: they are the cookies that a third party sets on your website to capture data from your users. Social networking companies such as Facebook and technology companies such as Google use this type of cookie.
The data collected through these cookies is used for digital targeted marketing, essentially showing advertisements according to the preferences of individuals. Third-party cookies install a package of data in the browser to track activity, although this tracking is only allowed on sites that permit the installation of third-party cookies.
The easiest way is to allow advertising services to install them on the website, placing advertisements or keeping the data for other commercial purposes. The benefit depends on factors such as the number of clicks on the advertisements. The data can also be used to segment users and offer, for example, memberships for exclusive content.
Only with the users’ consent. If a website uses tracking and third-party cookies, the consent of the users is mandatory, and monetisation is only possible if that consent meets the conditions of Article 4 GDPR: freely given, informed and specific.
Contact
Don’t be left in doubt, get in touch. We’ll be happy to help and offer you solutions.
Related tool, free to use: the data protection tools.
