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Comment by layer8 | Hacker News Reader

Cookie banners existed long before the GDPR, due to the ePrivacy Directive: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EPrivacy_Directive

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And the EU is actively working on creating a new ePrivacy Regulation [0] that would explicitly tackle the explosion of cookie banners.

> Simpler rules on cookies: the cookie provision, which has resulted in an overload of consent requests for internet users, will be streamlined. The new rule will be more user-friendly as browser settings will provide an easy way to accept or refuse tracking cookies and other identifiers. The proposal also clarifies that no consent is needed for non-privacy intrusive cookies that improve internet experience, such as cookies to remember shopping-cart history or to count the number of website visitors.

[0]: https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/eprivacy-r...

The assertion that the proliferation of cookie banners dates to 2002 does not pass the smell test. It was GDPR.

What smell test? I very much remember cookie banners being a problem way before the GDPR and so does the rest of the web:

(2012) https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-19505835

(2013) https://econsultancy.com/17-useful-examples-of-eu-cookie-law...

(2015) https://superuser.com/questions/725312/disable-all-cookie-wa...

(2013) https://ux.stackexchange.com/questions/40687/we-use-cookies-...

I must have been blind to the banners for a number of years :-). In any case, the larger point stands: the EU created the cookie banner mess that makes the Web worse for everybody, whether or not we are EU citizens. It seems the only debate is whether they have dawdled 14 years before attempting to address the issue or "only" 5 years.

It was the 2009 amendment of the ePrivacy Directive which introduced cookie consent, as noted in the Wikipedia article.

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