GitLab updates its cookie management tool

We recently completed a review of our cookie management tool and have decided to take this opportunity to improve the overall experience for our users by unifying our cookie management tool across all GitLab Inc. domains.

GitLab committed to not sending service usage data from our products (GitLab SaaS and self-managed) to a third-party product analytics service, and we keep that commitment with this update.

What is changing?

We’re unifying our cookie management tool across all GitLab Inc. domains to improve the user experience. Starting on 2021-10-12 we will deploy the OneTrust Cookie Management Tool to manage cookies across all gitlab.com sites. This change will provide users with a central location to opt in or out of cookies that are not strictly necessary for our site and its subdomains, including https://docs.gitlab.com/, about.gitlab.com and customers.gitlab.com.

We also plan to add a cookie to our trial signup flow and to our commerce flows located inside the gitlab.com application to enable us to understand how visitors are engaging with these pages and to help analyze and improve these flows and resolve any technical issues. This cookie will not be used for any tracking of how you use the functionality of our SaaS or self-managed products, and users can opt in or out of this cookie through our cookie management tool.

What won’t change

We will not be adding additional metrics or mechanisms to collect analytics data from our core product (including all GitLab features and categories). We will continue to honor the Do Not Track (DNT) mechanism in web browsers for both GitLab.com and GitLab Self-Managed users.

Timeline and implementation

We plan to roll out the new cookie management tool on 2021-10-12. This will replace our current cookie tool and will require users to review a new cookie notice and manage the settings of cookies on their next visit. Those settings will be retained per-device and per browser and can be modified after the original selection.