What Are Unclassified Cookies?

Unclassified cookies are cookies a scanner or consent-management system has found but has not yet assigned to a purpose category. The label means their purpose needs investigation—not that they form a distinct technical cookie type.

For example, a custom booking plugin may create a cookie that is missing from a scanner’s database. That cookie might maintain a booking session, remember a preference, or measure visitor activity.

To investigate it:

1. Identify its name, domain, and expiry.

2. Find the script, plugin, or service that creates it.

3. Check provider documentation or ask the developer what it does.

4. Assign the appropriate category and add an understandable purpose description.

5. Check that the website’s consent controls handle it accordingly.

A website cookie scan can provide a starting inventory, but a cookie’s name alone does not prove its purpose.

Do not automatically label it strictly necessary because its function is unknown. Likewise, “unclassified” does not itself prove that a cookie is harmful or that a website has violated a law.