This page sets out which cookies operate on our site, what each one does and how you can control them. It sits alongside our privacy policy and covers the same audience: readers in Australia who use our pokie reviews and casino rankings. Nothing described here involves payments, account balances or AUD transactions, since we publish reviews rather than run gambling services.
What a cookie actually is
A cookie is a small text file placed on your device when you open a web page. It stores a short string of data that the site can read back on your next visit, which is how a page retains a preference you set or recognises that you have been here before. Cookies cannot run programs, copy files from your device or carry viruses. Similar technologies serve the same purpose through different methods – pixel tags embedded in a page, and local storage held by the browser itself – and everything written below applies to those as well.
The categories we use
Essential cookies keep the site functioning. They retain information about dismissed notices, hold your consent selections and support basic security checks. These cannot be switched off through our consent panel because the site would stop working properly without them, though your browser can still block them.
Preference cookies store choices you make while reading, such as a display setting or a region selection. They exist purely so you are not asked the same question on every visit.
Analytics cookies count visitors and record which pages get opened, how long readers stay and which sections they skip. The reports we see are aggregated, so we learn that a paytable section holds attention while a comparison table gets scrolled past – not who did the scrolling. This data drives most of our editorial decisions about what to expand and what to cut.
Affiliate tracking cookies record that a visit to a casino originated from a link on our pages. When a reader signs up after following one, the operator’s network attributes the referral to us and pays commission accordingly. That commission funds the research and writing on this site, and the tracking is what makes it measurable. It does not affect our rankings, and it does not tell us anything about what a reader does inside a casino account.
Cookies set by others
Not every cookie on this site comes from us. Analytics providers, affiliate networks and any embedded content place their own, and those files are governed by the terms of the company that set them rather than by this page. We keep the list of third parties deliberately short and review it periodically, but we cannot control how an external provider changes its own practices. If the detail matters to you, their published policies are the authoritative source. Casino operators we link to are separate businesses entirely – once you follow a link and leave, their cookies and their rules apply.
How long they last
Session cookies disappear the moment you close the browser. Persistent cookies remain until they expire or you delete them, and expiry periods vary by purpose: consent records and preferences generally last months, analytics identifiers a limited period, and affiliate attribution files a window set by the network rather than by us. Deleting cookies manually removes them ahead of any expiry date.
Managing your choices
Our consent panel appears on a first visit and lets you accept or decline the non-essential categories. That choice can be revisited at any time through the cookie settings link in the site footer, and changing it takes effect immediately.
Browsers offer their own controls, usually under privacy or security settings, where cookies can be blocked entirely, cleared on exit or removed for a single site. Private browsing modes discard everything at the end of a session. Blocking analytics costs you nothing as a reader; blocking essential cookies may leave notices reappearing and some settings failing to save. Declining affiliate cookies does not restrict access to anything on this site.
Do Not Track
Browsers can send a Do Not Track signal, though no common standard governs how sites should respond to it. Our consent panel is the reliable way to record your preference with us.
Updates
This page changes when our providers change, when we add or remove a category, or when Australian regulatory guidance requires it. The revision date at the foot of the page shows when it was last amended, and material changes will be surfaced through the consent panel rather than applied without notice.
Questions
Anything unclear here can be raised through our contact page, including requests to explain a specific cookie or to have a record removed. This site is intended for readers aged 18 and over.