Ask HN: What if I don't show GDPR cookies consent for my personal blog?

1 pointjerrygoyal3 comments

I use Google analytics for my personal site and blog to track total views etc. GA uses cookies. I don't intend to use any ads so do I still need to show cookie consent banner? If so, is there any penalty if I don't show it and how likely is it in my case?

My site for reference: https://gourav.io

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Yes, from a legal perspective you shouldn’t be tracking people without their consent.

It’s incredibly unlikely anything will happen to you, but from an ethical perspective what you’re doing isn’t great.

Why do you even need tracking on a personal blog?

> Why do you even need tracking on a personal blog?

Nothing much, just basic need like total views, demographics etc to see how my site is performing and from where I'm getting visitors.

See, turning on demographics is the real problem. Doing that means that not only are you tracking folks without their consent, you’re also sending that data to Google for ad targeting purposes.

The reality is that you don’t need GA on a personal site unless you have thousands of pageviews a day. You’re not learning anything meaningful from the small amount of data you’re collecting.

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