First-Party Cookie

A cookie set by the website domain that a user is directly visiting, as opposed to third-party cookies set by external domains. When you visit example.com and it sets a cookie from example.com, that's a first-party cookie. First-party cookies enable essential website functionality like maintaining login sessions, remembering preferences, shopping carts, and basic analytics about site usage. From a privacy perspective, first-party cookies are generally less problematic than third-party cookies because they don't enable cross-site tracking. However, first-party cookies still process personal data and may require consent depending on their purpose—essential cookies typically don't require consent, while analytics and marketing cookies usually do under ePrivacy rules. Some organizations use first-party cookies for tracking purposes that would traditionally use third-party cookies, raising new privacy considerations. The distinction between first- and third-party cookies matters for both privacy regulations and browser tracking restrictions.