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What are cookies?

Manage your preferences

We're not referring to the yummy kind of cookies here!

Cookies are tiny text files that are placed on your computer when you visit a website. They help the website work properly, and are used for a number of reasons, e.g. to count visitors to a site, help you fill in forms, help content load quickly, or let website owners like us know which pages are most popular.

How do cookies work?

When you first visit a website that uses cookies, a simple text file is downloaded to your computer, which is then read each time you return to that same website. The file, called a 'cookie', can be used to remember your preferences or to personalise searches you've made in the past (like when a pizza company remembers your favourite order!)

Cookies can be placed on your computer by website owners themselves (these are called first-party cookies) or by a separate third-party website which will allow content or advertising to be delivered to you (these are called third party cookies).

What are your cookie choices?

We use cookies to allow the site to work for you, to improve your user experience, and to provide us with information about how our site is used. Here are the categories of the cookies that we use:

Strictly necessary cookies (first-party). These cookies are essential for a website to operate securely and deliver the information you need. They can’t be turned off.

Functional cookies (first party). These are the cookies which give you a better, more relevant experience on the site.

Performance cookies (first or third-party) help website-owners like us make improvements to our sites by collecting information about our users. This could be information such as how many people visited our sites, how long they stayed on our sites, and what pages they looked at

Marketing cookies (first or third-party). These are the cookies which allow us to deliver you the content you need for free! They help website owners like us fund the cost of running our sites by delivering relevant advertising to you

When you visit our site, you have an option to accept ALL cookies, or choose the type of cookies you’re comfortable to be placed on your device. We'll remember your choice for 30 days and ask for your consent again after this time, or every time after you clear your cookies.

Changing your cookies preferences

You can change your cookie preference at any time for all of the cookies - except those that are the strictly necessary ones! Without these strictly necessary cookies our websites just won’t work, and we won't be able to deliver any kind of content to you. These cookies are placed by default when you visit our site and are always active.

You can change your preference for the other three categories at any time by revisiting this page and clicking on 'Manage Cookies'.

Whenever you deactivate functional cookies, we clear these from your devices.

If you deactivate performance or marketing cookies, you'll need to clear your browser data to remove these cookies, as they may include third-party cookies (that aren't managed by us directly).

To clear your cookies please go to your browser settings and select 'Privacy and Security' and look for 'Cookies'. You can then clear individual cookies, or else clear all cookies at once.

You can also set your device to accept all cookies, to notify you when a cookie is issued, or not to receive cookies at all. You can usually find these settings in the 'Options' or 'Preferences' menu of your browser.

These links may be helpful, or you can use the 'Help' option in your browser:

Chrome cookie settings

[https://support.google.com/chrome/answer/95647?hl=en&ref_topic=14666]

Microsoft Edge cookie settings

[https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-edge/delete-cookies-in-microsoft-edge-63947406-40ac-c3b8-57b9-2a946a29ae09]

Firefox cookie settings

[https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/cookies-information-websites-store-on-your-computer?redirectslug=Cookies&redirectlocale=en-US]

Safari web and iOS cookie settings

[https://support.apple.com/en-gb/guide/safari/sfri11471/mac]

More information on cookies is available from the Information Commissioner’s Office [https://ico.org.uk/your-data-matters/online/cookies/] or All About Cookies [https://www.allaboutcookies.org/]

Retargeting services

To help you along your educational journey, we use retargeting services on behalf of our trusted clients (universities and higher education institution partners) to show you advertising that you may be interested in, based on what you’ve looked at on our site. You may see these ads when you're visiting other websites.

Retargeting sounds complicated but it's really not. It works by us having a look at the areas you looked at on our sites – such as course subjects or university locations – and then we'll create targeted online advertising campaigns on behalf of our clients. These ads are aimed at helping you make the right university choice, with a particular focus on the types of subjects and institutions you've previously looked at on our website.

We are able to do all this by using Cookies and Smart Pixel technologies, and to allow us to retarget users, we work with trusted partner companies such as Admedo and Mediamath.

What type of cookies do we use?

Strictly necessary cookies

These cookies are necessary for the operation of our website.

Cookie used Cookie Name Purpose Life time
1st party ORA_WX_SESSION This cookie is used to give each user a unique identifier so we can make your journey smoother while you are on the site. This might include keeping you logged in if you have registered or maintaining anything you may have shortlisted. At end of the session, when you close the browser.
1st party pgs_x This cookie is used to record the session information. At end of the session, when you close the browser.
1st party pgs_bsktid This cookie is used to record the comparison information. 6 months
1st party pgs_usertype This cookie is used to show the cookie pop-up for a first-time user. 1 year
1st party SR_region This cookie is used to store the region name and displays the selected location for a particular region. At end of the session, when you close the browser.
1st party cookie_splash_flag This cookie is used to record that the user has accepted the cookies policy on our site and reminds us not to show the same message. 1 year
1st party pgsuid Persistent login cookies are the cookies that are stored with your browser when you click the "remember me" button on the login form. 1 year
1st party compareLb_dont This cookie is used to hide the 'compare' option when the user clicks the "Don't show". At end of the session, when you close the browser.
1st party cookieconsent_v1 This cookie is used to store the user preference of manage cookie settings. 1 year
1st party pageLoadcount The cookie is used to track whether the user has already accepted cookies. 1 year
3rd party _ga This cookie helps us count the number of people visiting Postgraduate Search by tracking if you've visited before. 2 years
3rd party _gat_newTracker This cookie allows us to analyse the website usage, by users, to improve the content and services. 24 hours
3rd party AMP_TOKEN This cookie contains a token that can be used to retrieve a Client ID from AMP Client ID service. Other possible values indicate opt-out or an error retrieving a Client ID from AMP Client ID service. 1 year

Performance cookies.

These cookies let us recognise and count the number of visitors to our websites, and see how users move around the site. This information helps us to improve our site, for example, by making sure users can easily find what they’re looking for.

Cookie used Cookie Name Purpose Life time
1st party Nav_search_GA This cookie is used to log the keyword search from the homepage search bar. Once the page has got rendered the cookie will be deleted.
1st party LAT_LONG Identifies users latitudinal/longitudinal information. This information helps to assist clients in recruitment planning activity based on user’s regional data. At the end of the session, when you close your browser.
1st party PGS_YOE This cookie is used to record the year of entry information. At the end of the session, when you close your browser.
1st party VWO To allow different tests and track visitor behaviour on the website to deliver the best user experience. No personally identifiable information is collected. 100 days
1st party internal_interactions This cookie is used to keep track of user journey after they click on a PGS site link from a sponsored listing slot on the search results page. We use the information to analyse and improve the services provided. At the end of the session, when you close your browser.
1st party manual_internal_interactions This cookie is used to keep track of user journey after they click on a PGS site link from a manual boosting slot on the search results page. We use the information to analyse and improve the services provided. At the end of the session, when you close your browser.
1st party campaign_id This cookie is used to store the Widget ID(campaign_id) information. So, the marketing team is able to view those stats from the widget report area. At the end of the session, when you close your browser.

Functionality cookies

These cookies are used to recognise you when you return to our website. They let us personalise our content for you, greet you by name and remember your preferences (e.g. your choice of language, region etc.). If you choose not to receive functional cookies you may not be able to take full advantage of the website's features, and we may not be able to personalise your experience on our site.

Cookie used Cookie Name Purpose Life time
1st party pgs_track_id This cookie is used to record the unique track session information. 30 days
1st party pgs_random_value This helps us understand how many and type of featured institutions that have been served to a user of the duration of a session. This is to ensure that we are effectively randomising featured institutions for optimal user experience. At the end of the session, when you close the browser.
1st party registration_flag This cookie is used by us to show the acknowledgement message to the users only once after they sign up or fill in additional details As soon as the alert closes, this cookie will be deleted.

Marketing cookies

Marketing cookies are used to target advertising to a user (this is called behavioural targeting). They are often served by third party companies, and track a user across websites.

Disabling targeting cookies means you will still receive advertising, but it will not be tailored to your preferences.

Cookie used Cookie Name Type Purpose
3rd party Facebook Social Media These cookies enable you to share articles on Facebook.
3rd party Twitter Social Media These cookies enable you to share articles via Twitter.
3rd party YouTube Social Media These cookies enable you to view embedded YouTube videos on our site.
3rd party Admedo Retargeting These cookies let Admedo know when to serve ads, ensuring that ads are served to only to people who have previously visited the site.
3rd party Adroll Retargeting These cookies let Adroll know when to serve ads, ensuring that ads are served to only to people who have previously visited the site. This includes cross site tracking to tailor ads to user.
3rd party Google DoubleClick Advertising These cookies are used by Google's DoubleClick for Publishers system which serves the banner advertising on the site.
3rd party Google Adsense Advertising These cookies are used by Google's Adsense to measure interactions with ads and to prevent the same ad from being displayed too often.
3rd party GoogleAdServingTest Advertising This cookie is used to serve ads and advertising banners.
3rd party Mediamath Retargeting These cookies let Mediamath know when to serve ads, ensuring that ads are served only to people who have previously visited the site.