Cookies Policy

The Cookies Policy of Strategic Solutions (Int) Limited, (“SSIL”) explains what cookies are, how, SSIL use cookies and similar technologies on their websites, and what you can do to manage how cookies are used.

We are committed to protecting the personal information we collect when you use our websites and other services. We have appointed a third party to conduct a full audit of the cookies on our sites. When the audit is complete we will update this policy with more information about those cookies, including how you can opt out of them. This cookies policy contains more information on the following:

What are cookies and how we use them?

A cookie is a small file which asks permission to be placed on your computer's hard drive. Once you agree, the file is added and the cookie helps analyse web traffic or lets you know when you visit a particular site.

 Why we use Cookies?

Cookies are placed on your device in order to provide you with personalised access to essential services on our website, enhance website functionality and to deliver to you online ads that are tailored to your interests. Furthermore, cookies allow web applications to respond to you as an individual. The web application can tailor its operations to your needs, likes and dislikes by gathering and remembering information about your preferences. Overall, cookies help us provide you with a better website, by enabling us to monitor which pages you find useful and which you do not.

 Cookies Functionality

Cookies record information about your online preferences and help us to tailor our websites to your interests. Information provided by cookies can help us to analyse your use of our sites and help us to provide you with a better user experience. If you would like to find out more about cookies and how they work http://www.allaboutcookies.org/.

A cookie in no way gives us access to your computer or any information about you, other than the data you choose to share with us. You can choose to accept or decline cookies. Most web browsers automatically accept cookies, but you can usually modify your browser setting to decline cookies if you prefer. This may prevent you from taking full advantage of the website. If you are a registered user or subscriber it may also collect your name and email address, which may be transferred to data processors for registered user or subscriber verification purposes.

 Type of Cookies

Cookies are either ‘session’ or ‘persistent’ cookies, depending on how long they are stored for:

·       Session cookies are temporary and deleted after you closed down your no sooner you close down your browser.

·       Persistent cookies are saved on your device for a fixed period of time after the browser has closed and are activated each time you visit the website where the cookie was generated. In addition to cookies, web beacons are used as well on this website.  A web beacon is a line of code which is used by a website or, less frequently, a third party ad server to measure a user’s activity, such as interaction with an advert or purchase of a product.  A web beacon is often invisible because it is only 1 x 1 pixel in size with no colour.  A web beacon can also be known as a web bug, 1 by 1 GIF, invisible GIF and tracker GIF.

We use traffic log cookies to identify which pages are being used. This helps us analyse data about web page traffic and improve our website in order to tailor it to customer needs. We only use this information for statistical analysis purposes and then the data is removed from the system.

How does SSIL use cookies?

We, together with our affiliates and other trusted partners, use cookies for the following purposes:

1.     Essential and Functional Cookies

We use these cookies to enable certain online functionality including:

·       identify returning users, registrants and subscribers and to allow them to be presented with a personalised version of the site;

·       eliminating the need for returning users to re-enter their login details;

·       commenting on our sites;

2.     Analytical Performance Cookies

We use these cookies to measure users’ behaviour to better develop our websites.  By using web analytics services provided by Google Analytics and comScore Digital Analytics we can analyse which pages are viewed and how long for and which links are followed, and we can use this information to provide more content which is of interest.  We also use this analysis to report on our performance and to sell advertising.

3.     Behavioural Advertising Cookies and Web beacons

We use these cookies to:

·       manage online advertising and revenue share arrangements.  Our approved, advertising partners, primarily DoubleClick, Audience Science and AdMeld, use cookies together with web beacons to provide advertising to you and to enable us to manage our relationship with those advertisers by, for example, tracking how many unique users have seen a particular advertisement or followed a link in an advertisement.

·       to measure general user behaviour across our sites and third party sites to build a profile based on users browsing patterns so that we and third parties can target advertising to users that will be more relevant to users’ interests.  This means that if, for example, users visit a page with a review about a particular camera then the cookie will collect this information and we may target adverts for that camera to those users and, if users visit third party sites that are part of the same advertising network, those third parties may target adverts for that camera to those users.

·       to create profiles that trusted third parties can buy to allow them to better target their advertising with more relevant content.

We also include web beacons (also known as clear GIFs or web bugs) in our emails to track the success of our marketing campaigns. This means that if you open an email from us we can see which of the pages of our Website you have visited. Our web beacons do not store additional information on your device but, by communicating with our cookies on your device, they can tell us when you have opened our email. The information generated by the cookie about your use of our sites (including your IP address) will be transmitted to and stored on servers in the UK and the USA. They may also transfer this information to third parties where required to do so by law, or where such third parties process the information on their behalf.  By using this website, you consent to the processing of data about you by those service providers in the manner and for the purposes set out above. We cannot control nor do we have access to any cookies placed on your computer by third party advertisers and sponsors.

4.     Other Third Party Cookies

You may notice on some pages of our websites that cookies have been set that are not related to SSIL. When you visit a page with content embedded from, for example, YouTube or Facebook, these third party service providers may set their own cookies on your device. SSIL does not control the use of these third party cookies and cannot access them due to the way that cookies work, as cookies can only be accessed by the party who originally set them. Please check the third party websites for more information about these cookies.

 Some of our websites use Adobe Flash Player to deliver video and game content to users. Adobe utilise their own cookies, which are not manageable through your browser settings but are used by the Flash Player for similar purposes, such as storing preferences or tracking users.  Flash Cookies work in a different way to web browser cookies; rather than having individual cookies for particular jobs, a website is restricted to storing all data in one cookie. You can control how much data, if any, may be stored in that cookie but you cannot choose what type of information is allowed to be stored. You can manage which websites can store information in Flash cookies on your device via the website storage settings panel on the Adobe website.

How does SSIL keep track of the cookies on its websites?

We conduct an audit of all cookies being used across our website portfolio on a regular basis.

How can I manage or opt out of cookies?

Some people find the idea of a website storing information on their device a little intrusive, in particular when the information is stored and used by a third party. For example, you may object to being served advertising which is targeted to your interests based on your browsing history. If you would prefer to opt out of cookies, it is possible to control cookies by following the steps below, however you should be aware that you might lose some features and functionality of the website if you do so.

 Deleting Cookies

Cookies, including those which have already been set, can be deleted from your hard drive. You can also change the preferences/settings in your web browser to control cookies. In some cases, you can choose to accept cookies from the primary site, but block them from third parties. In others, you can block cookies from specific advertisers, or clear out all cookies. Deleting or blocking cookies may reduce functionality of the site.

 Rejecting Cookies

If you would like to know more about how to reject cookies, visit www.allaboutcookies.org or go to the help menu within your internet browser. If you experience any problems having deleted cookies, you should contact the supplier of your web browser.

 Opting out of Analytical Performance Cookies:

If you would like to opt out of Analytics cookies, please do so by clicking on the link: Google Analytics: https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout

 Opting out of Behavioural Advertising Cookies:

If you would like to disable “third party” cookies generated by advertisers or providers of targeted advertising services, you can turn them off by going to the third party’s website and getting them to generate a one-time “no thanks” cookie that will stop any further cookies being written to your machine. Here are links to the main third party advertising platforms we use, each of which have instructions on how to do this: http://www.google.com/privacy_ads.html.  If you want to decline online behavioural advertising, you may do so by visiting www.networkadvertising.org/managing/opt_out.asp

 Web Beacons

If you object to web beacons in emails, we recommend that you follow the instructions for deleting existing cookies and disabling SSIL’s cookies above. We will still know how many of our emails are opened and we will automatically receive your IP address, a unique identifier of your device or other access device; but we will not identify you as an individual.

Further information and contact details

Please contact SSIL’s Data Protection team if you would like more information on the cookies that we use and their purposes, by emailing SSIL at webmaster@stratsolutionsint.com

For more information about cookies please visit www.allaboutcookies.org and for more information about behavioural advertising in particular please visit www.youronlinechoices.com/uk/.

General information about data protection may be found at: Information Commissioner’s website: http://www.ico.gov.uk or Direct Marketing Association: http://www.dma.org.uk or

Consumer advice from the DMA: http://www.dmaresponsibility.org