On Mon, Mar 10, 2014 at 8:46 AM, Manuel Schneider < manuel.schneider@wikimedia.ch> wrote:
The issue at hand is: EU privacy policy 95/46/EG[1] allows usage of cookies only if
- the user has been informed beforehand in detail
- the user has accepted the cookie
- this acceptance was given freely, without doubt and through by action
(This is the summary by the Article 29 Working Party issued in a Working Document 02/2013[2] on October 2nd, 2013.)
An example how this is being implemented can be seen (...) here:
That page actually sets a cookie without getting your consent first, and so does the other EU website you have linked. Which is a good indication of how seriously this is taken in the EU - not at all. Some content providers show you a small banner saying "by browsing our site you accept cookies blah blah blah" when you first visit, most don't even bother to do that.
I doubt there is any need to change MediaWiki because of that. There are several drop-in javascript plugins (CookieCuttr http://cookiecuttr.com/, Cookie Consent http://demo.cookieconsent.silktide.com/ etc) which a site admin can easily install if they want to ask for consent, but in practice that is not expected even from major websites, whatever the (not legally binding) recommendation from the Article 29 WP says.