Cookie Policy | Consular Services

Cookies are small text files which are stored on your computer by your web browser and used by a website to read and write data which is used to improve your browsing experience.

Our website uses cookies which fall into 3 basic categories, these are 'essential cookies', 'analytics cookies' and 'functional cookies'.

  1. Essential Cookies – Some cookies are essential for the operation of our website. For example, some cookies allow the Content Management System we use to track your browsing session and identify you if you are logged in. This ensures that you can access the information you should be able to.
  2. Analytics Cookies – We utilise other cookies to analyse how our visitors use our websites and to monitor website performance. This allows us to improve the website and more quickly identify and fix any issues that arise. For example, we might use analytics cookies to keep track of which pages are most popular and to determine why others are not.
  3. Functionality Cookies – We use functionality cookies to allow us to remember your preferences. For example we may give you the option to have your username remembered if you access a password protected area or recall a preference for information of a particular type on the home page. Third party services such as Twitter, Facebook, Google Plus and AddThis may also write cookies to your computer which may be used 'on' our website to determine if you are logged in to those services should you choose to 'share' content socially.

The table below details the specific cookies that are read and written by this website (domain). This excludes cookies that are set as a result of third party services we use.

Cookie Name Category/Description More Information
Google Analytics _ga, _gid Analytics – These cookies are used to collect information about how visitors use our site. We use the information to compile reports and to help us improve the site. The cookies collect information in an anonymous form, including the number of visitors to the site, where visitors have come to the site from and the pages they visited. Google Analytics Privacy Policy
ExpressionEngine exp_last_activity, exp_last_visit, exp_tracker Essential – These cookies are used by our website Content Management System (ExpressionEngine) to track your session state anonymously. The exp_last_activity and exp_last_visit cookies have a lifetime of 1 year and the exp_tracker expires when you close your browser window.  
AddThis __atuvc, __atuvs, loc, uvc, mus, ouid, uid Functional/Analytics – These cookies is used by AddThis.com to ensure that the share counts for pages are updated when you share a page using their service. __atuvc, __atuvs have a lifespan of 1 month. loc, uvc have a lifetime of 396 days, and mus, ouid, uid have a lifetime of 390 days. You can opt-out here: https://www.addthis.com/privacy/opt-out

You can disable cookies for this and any website you visit using controls built into your web browser. You can use your web browser (eg Internet Explorer) to:

  • delete all cookies
  • block all cookies
  • allow all cookies
  • block third-party cookies
  • clear all cookies when you close the browser
  • open a 'private browsing' session
  • install add-ons and plug-ins to extend broswer functionality

You can find full guidance on how to disable or otherwise control cookies that are written to your computer by your web browser at the corresponding browser vendor websites:

You can find out more about cookies, at AllAboutCookies.org.

You can opt out of being tracked by Google Analytics across all websites by visiting http://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout.