Cookies policy
This page outlines the cookie policy for the British Geological Survey (‘BGS, ‘we’, ‘us’ or ‘our’) website. Your use of this website is subject to our terms of use.
When we provide services, we want to make them easy, useful and reliable. This sometimes involves placing small amounts of information on your device, for example, your computer or mobile phone. These include small files known as cookies. They cannot be used to identify you personally.
Cookies are used to improve services for you, for example by:
- enabling a service to recognise your device so you don’t have to give the same information during one task
- recognising that you have already given a username and password so you don’t need to enter it for every web page requested
- measuring how many people are using services, so they can be made easier to use and that there is enough capacity to ensure they are fast.
Our website uses Google Analytics. It installs cookies to help us identify errors and accurately estimate visitor numbers. These cookies do not collect personal data about visitors to our website.
You can learn about cookies and how to manage them (All About Cookies).
For further information on cookies used by this website please contact us.
Email: enquiries@bgs.ac.uk
Cookies used on our website
| Name | Purpose | Expires |
|---|---|---|
| CookieControl | Used to hold setting on whether to allow cookies to be stored or not | 3 months |
| _ga, _gid | Used to distinguish users | 1 month |
| _gat | Used to throttle the request rate – limiting the collection of data on high traffic sites | 1 day |
| BIGipServer-xxxxxxx | These cookies are set by our web server infrastructure to ensure your web requests are consistently processed by the same server in our infrastructure for the duration of your session | End of session |
| __wpdm_client | Used to synchronise the website with the content management system | End of session |
| OTZ | The “OTZ” cookie is used by Google analytics to track website traffic information | 9 days |
| _GRECAPTCHA | Used to provide SPAM protection | 6 months |
| SEARCH_SAMESITE | Allows servers to mitigate the risk of CSRF and information leakage attacks by asserting that a particular cookie should only be sent with requests initiated from the same registrable domain. | 4 months |
| SOCS | Used to store a user’s state regarding their cookies choices | 10 months |
| AEC | AEC cookies ensure that requests within a browsing session are made by the user, and not by other sites. These cookies prevent malicious sites from acting on behalf of a user without that user’s knowledge | 3 months |
| 1P_JAR | Based on recent searches and previous interactions, custom ads are shown on Google sites | 1 month |
| __Secure-xxxxxSID | Builds a profile of website visitor interests to show relevant and personalized ads through retargeting | 12 months |
| APISID | Google may set this cookie on your phone, tablet or computer once you click on the YouTube video player. Used to personalise Google ads on websites based on recent searches and interactions | 13 months |
| SSID | Google may set this cookie on your phone, tablet or computer once you click on the YouTube video player. Used to collect visitor information for videos hosted by YouTube on maps integrated with Google Maps | 13 months |
| SID | Google may set this cookie on your phone, tablet or computer once you click on the YouTube video player. This cookie contains digitally signed and encrypted records of a user’s Google Account ID and most recent sign-in time. Used to block many types of attack, such as attempts to steal the content of forms submitted in Google services | 13 months |
| _Secure-xxSID | Google may set this cookie on your phone, tablet or computer once you click on the YouTube video player. Used to build a profile of website visitor interests to show relevant and personalised ads through retargeting | 13 months |
| SAPISID | Google may set this cookie on your phone, tablet or computer once you click on the YouTube video player. This cookie collects visitor information for videos hosted by YouTube | 13 months |
| HSID | Google may set this cookie on your phone, tablet or computer once you click on the YouTube video player. This cookie contains digitally signed and encrypted records of a user’s Google Account ID and most recent sign-in time. Used to block many types of attack, such as attempts to steal the content of forms submitted in Google services | 13 months |
Cookies for session management on BGS Applications
The JSESSIONID cookie is used on the following BGS applications.
- Hayward collection application
- Magnetogram recordings collection application
- Online shops (http://shop.bgs.ac.uk and http://shop.bgs.ac.uk/gsni/georecords/)
- AssetBank (http://geoscenic.bgs.ac.uk)
- Djatoka IIPViewer (http://scans.bgs.ac.uk)
| Cookie name | Purpose | Typical content | Expires |
|---|---|---|---|
| JSESSIONID | To remember your selections or preferences that you’ve already made when looking at information or using a service | 783011f2 5ee5ed6b 7df556467352741 482a1 | When you close your browser or navigate away from the BGS websites, or after 20 minutes of inactivity |
Cookies to stop multiple submissions
Used on the Earthquake seismology website (https://quakes.bgs.ac.uk/)
| Cookie name | Purpose | Typical content | Expires |
|---|---|---|---|
| QUES0 | In completing a task, to enable you to complete the task without re-entering information already given | day%3A%3A27–%3Emon%3A%3A5–%3Eyear%3A%3A2011–%3Ehr%3A%3A10–%3Emin%3A%3A35–%3E | Expires one week after submission of questionnaire |
| QUES1 | In completing a task, to enable you to complete the task without re-entering information already given | day%3A%3A27–%3Emon%3A%3A5–%3Eyear%3A%3A2011–%3Ehr%3A%3A10–%3Emin%3A%3A35–%3E | Expires one week after submission of questionnaire |
| QUES2 | In completing a task, to enable you to complete the task without re-entering information already given | day%3A%3A27–%3Emon%3A%3A5–%3Eyear%3A%3A2011–%3Ehr%3A%3A10–%3Emin%3A%3A35–%3E | Expires one week after submission of questionnaire |
| QUES3 | In completing a task, to enable you to complete the task without re-entering information already given | day%3A%3A27–%3Emon%3A%3A5–%3Eyear%3A%3A2011–%3Ehr%3A%3A10–%3Emin%3A%3A35–%3E | Expires one week after submission of questionnaire |
| QUES4 | In completing a task, to enable you to complete the task without re-entering information already given | day%3A%3A27–%3Emon%3A%3A5–%3Eyear%3A%3A2011–%3Ehr%3A%3A10–%3Emin%3A%3A35–%3E | Expires one week after submission of questionnaire |
| QUESHID | In completing a task, to enable you to complete the task without re-entering information already given | day%3A%3A27–%3Emon%3A%3A5–%3Eyear%3A%3A2011–%3Ehr%3A%3A10–%3Emin%3A%3A35–%3E | Expires one week after submission of questionnaire |
Third parties
Please note that third parties (including, for example, advertising networks and providers of external services like web traffic analysis services) may also use cookies, over which we have no control. These cookies are likely to be analytical/performance cookies or targeting cookies.
To opt out of third parties collecting any data regarding your interaction on our website, please refer to their websites for further information.
How to control and delete cookies
We will not use cookies to collect personally identifiable information about you.
You may wish to visit About Cookies, which contains comprehensive information on how to do restrict and block cookies on a wide variety of browsers. You will also find details on how to delete cookies from your machine as well as more general information about cookies.
Please be aware that restricting cookies may impact on the functionality of our site.
Review
This policy was reviewed in August 2023.