Cookies and local storage

Access Compass · accesscompass.uk · last updated 2 October 2026

Access Compass sets no cookies and has no analytics. One outside service, Wikimedia, may set a cookie when your device loads place photos. We explain this below.

The place photos come from Wikimedia Commons under their open licences. They load from Wikimedia's servers, which may set their own cookie (WMF-Uniq). We do not set it and we cannot control it. See the Wikimedia privacy policy.

We do not track you

We do not set cookies to follow you around the web, we do not run advertising networks, and we do not use analytics services that profile your behaviour. Under the UK Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations (PECR), the kind of cookie that needs your consent is the tracking or advertising kind, and we do not use any.

What we use instead: local storage

To remember your display choices, access profile and saved items between visits, the app uses your browser's local storage. This is not a cookie. It is a small space on your own device that only this app, on your device, can read.

It stays on your device. The only part that ever leaves it is a report you choose to send. If a report cannot be sent straight away, it waits in local storage until it reaches us.
The app also keeps a copy of its own pages on your device so it can work offline, and the Access Mate files if you choose to download them.
It is strictly necessary for the app to remember your preferences, so it does not require a consent banner under PECR.
You are always in control: you can clear it at any time from your browser's settings for this site.

Following a link to a service. If you choose to follow a link out to a listed service's own website, that website may set its own cookies. That is outside Access Compass and governed by their policies, not ours. The same applies if you play a video: YouTube may store information on your device.

When the app asks our server how many reports each video has had, it sends no cookies. Our Privacy Policy explains this check.

Clearing your data

Because everything is on your device, you hold the off switch. Clearing this site's storage in your browser, or uninstalling the app, removes everything Access Compass has saved on your device. Your settings and saved items were never sent to a server. A report you chose to send us, such as a correction or a video report, is kept by us so we can check it. Clearing your browser does not remove it.

The lack of tracking cookies applies everywhere Access Compass is used, including our Victoria, Australia edition; no consent banner is needed there either, for the same reason: there is nothing non-essential to consent to. For the fuller picture of how the app handles data, see our data protection statement.

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