Killing _utma _utmb _utmc _utmz Cookies
For those of us who are cookie-conscious as we surf the web, you’re aware that a lot of sites give cookies with names like _utma, _utmb, _utmc, and _utmz. It turns out that these cookies come from Google Analytics.
However, using AdBlock Plus, there is an easy way to kill it. To put in a filter for it, click the “ABP” stop sign icon, and click the “New Filter…” button. Enter “http://www.google-analytics.com/*” and press Enter. That’s it! Those _utm* cookies are now a thing of the past.
Mario Uecker said,
May 13, 2009 at 7:06 pm
Thank you very much! It works
Pedro said,
May 25, 2009 at 9:51 am
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Tommy_B said,
September 19, 2009 at 12:05 am
I too had hoped this would put an end to the scourge of the tracking cookies… I actually modified my host file rather than use Adblock simply because I know more about my host file than Adblock
unfortunately, it only blocks Google Analytics tracking. There are plenty of others out there. I haven’t quite figured out how to deal with those yet, what the names and content of their cookies are.
Also, there are sites that host that host their own analytics apps right on the server. I found this out on, surprise surprise, Mozilla’s Privacy Policy page
http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/legal/privacy/firefox-en.html .
I had already successfully tested GA cookie blocking so I knew that was working. I was doing some other testing on cookies and saw some from Mozilla so I decided to take a look and was surprised to see: the typical _utma, _utmb, _utmc and _utmz (the content in these were standard) plus s_vi, s_sq, and s_cc (couldn’t decipher the content in these three).
I thought, damn, the blocking didn’t work. So I looked at the source of the page and this was the relevant code I found:
<!– SiteCatalyst Reporting –>
<script type=”text/javascript”>s_account=”mozillacom”;</script>
<script src=”/js/s_code.js” type=”text/javascript”></script>
Aha, well there was my answert: this part of the third line
script src=”/js/s_code.js”
indicates that the same server hosting the html page is also the source of that script, presumably generating the cookies (at least I assume that’s the purpose of that script, the note right above the beginning does say “SiteCatalyst Reporting”)
At least with mozilla, you can block all cookies and everything still works right.
And if people just keep hopping on the GA bandwagon then there won’t be too much more trouble trying to block the analytics of GA’s competitors.
Thanks for the post.
Tommy_B said,
September 19, 2009 at 12:09 am
oops, looks like I got filtered! if you navigate to the Mozilla Privacy Policy URL I reference above, the portion of the source code I am talking about begins right after the end of the heading; if you’re using FF, just look for the first line of green text.
Ed: Fixed the text in the above comment – thanks for the info!