Cookie Policy
What are cookies?
This Cookie Policy explains what cookies are, how we use them, the types of cookies we use (i.e., the information we collect using cookies and how that information is used), and how to manage your cookie settings.
Cookies are small text files used to store small pieces of information. They are stored on your device when a website loads in your browser. Similar technologies, all collectively referred to as "cookies" here, include pixels, transparent GIF files, log files, scripts, web beacons, and other similar tools. These technologies help ensure that the website functions properly, enhance security, provide a better user experience, analyze performance to identify what works and where improvements are needed, and deliver relevant advertisements.
How do we use cookies?
Like most online services, our website uses both first-party and third-party cookies for various purposes. First-party cookies are primarily necessary for the website to function properly and do not collect any personally identifiable data.
The third-party cookies used on our website primarily help us understand how the website performs, track how you interact with it, keep our services secure, deliver relevant advertisements, and enhance your overall user experience while improving the speed of your future interactions with our website.
For users located in the EU/UK/EEA:
Except for cookies that are strictly necessary for site operation, we will place cookies on your device (including for analytics or advertising) only if you give your consent through our cookie banner or settings. You can change or withdraw consent at any time.
Types of cookies we use
Necessary
Necessary cookies are required to enable the basic features of this site, such as providing secure log-in or adjusting your consent preferences. These cookies do not store any personally identifiable data.
| Cookie | Duration | Description |
|---|---|---|
| harvard_health_session | 2 hours | Used to keep track of the active user's session data. |
| fv | 1 year 1 month 4 days | Indicates the first page visit of the current session. |
| cart_id | 1 month | Used to keep track of the user's active cart items. |
| welcomeShown | 3 days | Tracks whether or not the welcome popup has shown. |
| XSRF-TOKEN | 2 hours | This cookie enhances visitor browsing security by preventing cross-site request forgery. |
| _GRECAPTCHA | 6 months | Google Recaptcha service sets this cookie to identify bots to protect the website against malicious spam attacks. |
| rc::a | Never Expires | This cookie is set by the Google recaptcha service to identify bots to protect the website against malicious spam attacks. |
| rc::f | Never Expires | This cookie is set by the Google recaptcha service to identify bots to protect the website against malicious spam attacks. |
| rc::b | session | This cookie is set by the Google recaptcha service to identify bots to protect the website against malicious spam attacks. |
| rc::c | session | This cookie is set by the Google recaptcha service to identify bots to protect the website against malicious spam attacks. |
| hide_newsletter | past | Tracks whether the newsletter signup popups should be shown. |
| cookieyes-* | 1 year | CookieYes sets this cookie for consent solution management. |
| __cf_bm | 1 hour | This cookie, set by Cloudflare, is used to support Cloudflare Bot Management. |
| _cfuvid | session | Cloudflare sets this cookie to track users across sessions to optimize user experience by maintaining session consistency and providing personalized services. |
| VISITOR_PRIVACY_METADATA | 6 months | YouTube sets this cookie to store the user's cookie consent state for the current domain. |
| dd_testcookie | session | Used by DataDog bot protection to test if the browser accepts cookies and distinguish human visitors from automated bots. |
| _hjSessionUser_* | 1 year | Hotjar sets this cookie to ensure data from subsequent visits to the same site is attributed to the same user ID, which persists in the Hotjar User ID, which is unique to that site. |
| _hjSession_* | 1 hour | Hotjar sets this cookie to ensure data from subsequent visits to the same site is attributed to the same user ID, which persists in the Hotjar User ID, which is unique to that site. |
| _hjTLDTest | session | To determine the most generic cookie path that has to be used instead of the page hostname, Hotjar sets the _hjTLDTest cookie to store different URL substring alternatives until it fails. |
Functional
Functional cookies help perform certain functionalities like sharing the content of the website on social media platforms, collecting feedback, and other third-party features.
| Cookie | Duration | Description |
|---|---|---|
| yt-remote-connected-devices | Never Expires | YouTube sets this cookie to store the user's video preferences using embedded YouTube videos. |
| ytidb::LAST_RESULT_ENTRY_KEY | Never Expires | The cookie ytidb::LAST_RESULT_ENTRY_KEY is used by YouTube to store the last search result entry that was clicked by the user. This information is used to improve the user experience by providing more relevant search results in the future. |
| yt-remote-device-id | Never Expires | YouTube sets this cookie to store the user's video preferences using embedded YouTube videos. |
| yt-remote-session-name | session | The yt-remote-session-name cookie is used by YouTube to store the user's video player preferences using embedded YouTube video. |
| yt-remote-fast-check-period | session | The yt-remote-fast-check-period cookie is used by YouTube to store the user's video player preferences for embedded YouTube videos. |
| yt-remote-session-app | session | The yt-remote-session-app cookie is used by YouTube to store user preferences and information about the interface of the embedded YouTube video player. |
| yt-remote-cast-available | session | The yt-remote-cast-available cookie is used to store the user's preferences regarding whether casting is available on their YouTube video player. |
| yt-remote-cast-installed | session | The yt-remote-cast-installed cookie is used to store the user's video player preferences using embedded YouTube video. |
| VISITOR_INFO1_LIVE | 6 months | A cookie set by YouTube to measure bandwidth that determines whether the user gets the new or old player interface. |
Analytics
Analytics cookies are used to understand how visitors interact with the website. These cookies help provide information on metrics such as the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc.
| Cookie | Duration | Description |
|---|---|---|
| h_zdbb | 6 months | This pixel is used for analytics and audience measurement.
|
| csp | 1 month | This pixel is used for analytics and audience measurement.
|
| AWSALBAPP-0 | 7 days | Delivra Cookie: When you fill out a form on our site, this cookie helps ensure your session runs smoothly behind the scenes. It works by keeping your connection routed to the same server throughout your visit - so your form submission is processed consistently without interruption.
This is purely a functional cookie. It does not track your browsing behavior, store personal information, or serve any marketing purpose. |
| AWSALBAPP-1 | 7 days | Delivra Cookie: When you fill out a form on our site, this cookie helps ensure your session runs smoothly behind the scenes. It works by keeping your connection routed to the same server throughout your visit - so your form submission is processed consistently without interruption.
This is purely a functional cookie. It does not track your browsing behavior, store personal information, or serve any marketing purpose. |
| AWSALBAPP-2 | 7 days | Delivra Cookie: When you fill out a form on our site, this cookie helps ensure your session runs smoothly behind the scenes. It works by keeping your connection routed to the same server throughout your visit - so your form submission is processed consistently without interruption.
This is purely a functional cookie. It does not track your browsing behavior, store personal information, or serve any marketing purpose. |
| AWSALBAPP-3 | 7 days | Delivra Cookie: When you fill out a form on our site, this cookie helps ensure your session runs smoothly behind the scenes. It works by keeping your connection routed to the same server throughout your visit - so your form submission is processed consistently without interruption.
This is purely a functional cookie. It does not track your browsing behavior, store personal information, or serve any marketing purpose. |
| zd_session_id | session | This pixel is used for analytics and audience measurement.
|
| zpack | session | This pixel is used for analytics and audience measurement.
|
| zd_cs_go | 2 hours | This pixel is used for analytics and audience measurement.
|
| _ga | 1 year 1 month 4 days | Google Analytics sets this cookie to calculate visitor, session and campaign data and track site usage for the site's analytics report. The cookie assigns a randomly generated number to recognize unique visitors. |
| _gid | 1 day | Google Analytics sets this cookie to store information on how visitors use a website while also creating an analytics report of the website's performance. Some of the collected data includes the number of visitors, their source, and the pages they visit anonymously. |
| _ga_* | 1 year 1 month 4 days | Google Analytics sets this cookie to store and count page views. |
| zd_cs_ru | 2 hours | This pixel is used for analytics and audience measurement.
|
| __Secure-YNID | 6 months | Used to track viewed YouTube videos, statistical data, and personalization. |
| __Secure-ROLLOUT_TOKEN | 6 months | Used to manage the rollout of new features and updates. |
| __Secure-YEC | past | Used by YouTube to detect and prevent spam, fraud, and abuse. |
| vuid | 1 year 1 month 4 days | Vimeo installs this cookie to collect tracking information by setting a unique ID to embed videos on the website. |
| YSC | session | YSC cookie is set by Youtube and is used to track the views of embedded videos on Youtube pages. |
Performance
Performance cookies are used to understand and analyze the key performance indexes of the website which helps in delivering a better user experience for the visitors.
| Cookie | Duration | Description |
|---|---|---|
| _gat | 1 minute | Google Universal Analytics sets this cookie to restrain request rate and thus limit data collection on high-traffic sites. |
Advertisement
Advertisement cookies are used to provide visitors with customized advertisements based on the pages you visited previously and to analyze the effectiveness of the ad campaigns.
| Cookie | Duration | Description |
|---|---|---|
| _ab_csid | 1 year | Allows programmatic demand sources to track their users. |
| dlv-suid | session | Session GUID - a session-level identifier for the visitor
Delivra Cookie: When you fill out a form on our site, this cookie helps ensure your session runs smoothly behind the scenes. It works by keeping your connection routed to the same server throughout your visit - so your form submission is processed consistently without interruption. This is purely a functional cookie. It does not track your browsing behavior, store personal information, or serve any marketing purpose. |
| dlv-leadlandurl | session | Lead Source Landing URL - the first URL the visitor landed on (entry page tracking)
Delivra Cookie: When you fill out a form on our site, this cookie helps ensure your session runs smoothly behind the scenes. It works by keeping your connection routed to the same server throughout your visit - so your form submission is processed consistently without interruption. This is purely a functional cookie. It does not track your browsing behavior, store personal information, or serve any marketing purpose. |
| dlv-leadft | 1 year | Lead Source First Touch - timestamp or source of the first interaction (for attribution)
Delivra Cookie: When you fill out a form on our site, this cookie helps ensure your session runs smoothly behind the scenes. It works by keeping your connection routed to the same server throughout your visit - so your form submission is processed consistently without interruption. This is purely a functional cookie. It does not track your browsing behavior, store personal information, or serve any marketing purpose. |
| dlv-leadlt | session | Lead Source Last Touch - timestamp or source of the most recent interaction
Delivra Cookie: When you fill out a form on our site, this cookie helps ensure your session runs smoothly behind the scenes. It works by keeping your connection routed to the same server throughout your visit - so your form submission is processed consistently without interruption. This is purely a functional cookie. It does not track your browsing behavior, store personal information, or serve any marketing purpose. |
| dlv-auid | 1 year | Anonymous user contact id GUID - identifies the Delivra account or anonymous user
Delivra Cookie: When you fill out a form on our site, this cookie helps ensure your session runs smoothly behind the scenes. It works by keeping your connection routed to the same server throughout your visit - so your form submission is processed consistently without interruption. This is purely a functional cookie. It does not track your browsing behavior, store personal information, or serve any marketing purpose. |
| _gcl_au | 3 months | Google Tag Manager sets this cookie to experiment advertisement efficiency of websites using their services. |
| yt.innertube::nextId | Never Expires | YouTube sets this cookie to register a unique ID to store data on what videos from YouTube the user has seen. |
| yt.innertube::requests | Never Expires | YouTube sets this cookie to register a unique ID to store data on what videos from YouTube the user has seen. |
Uncategorized
Other uncategorized cookies are those that are being analyzed and have not been classified into a category as yet.
| Cookie | Duration | Description |
|---|---|---|
| fu | 1 month | This pixel is used for analytics and audience measurement.
|
Manage cookie preferences
You can modify your cookie settings anytime by clicking the 'Consent Preferences' button above. This will allow you to revisit the cookie consent banner and update your preferences or withdraw your consent immediately.
Additionally, different browsers offer various methods to block and delete cookies used by websites. You can change the settings of your browser to block/delete the cookies. Listed below are the links to the support documents on how to manage and delete cookies from the major web browsers.
Chrome: https://support.google.com/accounts/answer/32050
Safari: https://support.apple.com/en-in/guide/safari/sfri11471/mac
Firefox: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/clear-cookies-and-site-data-firefox
Internet Explorer: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/topic/how-to-delete-cookie-files-in-internet-explorer-bca9446f-d873-78de-77ba-d42645fa52fc
If you are using a different web browser, please refer to its official support documentation for cookie management instructions.
Contact Us
For questions about our Cookie Policy, or to exercise your rights regarding cookies or personal data, please contact hhp_info@hms.harvard.edu or see the Privacy Policy above.
