About this cookie policy
The City of Antwerp believes it is important for you to be able to consult its information anytime and anywhere across different platforms. The City of Antwerp is also working on interactive services and services that are tailored to you. To make that possible, the online services of the City of Antwerp make use of technologies such as cookies.
In this cookie policy, we will inform you what types of cookies are used and why. We also explain the extent to which you can control how they are used. The City of Antwerp is committed to ensuring your privacy and the usability of its online services as much as possible.
This cookie policy applies to all online services of the City of Antwerp, in particular all websites, (mobile) applications and internet services provided by the City of Antwerp.
The data that you provide and we obtain from you are processed by the City of Antwerp, with registered offices at Grote Markt 1, B-2000 Antwerp, under the supervision of the city's Data Protection Officer, Ms Anne Baré. Please direct any questions and/or comments to the above address or to the city's contact centre (open every working day from 9am to 5pm, on +32 (0)3 22 11 333 or at informatieveiligheid@antwerpen.be.
We recommend that you also read the privacy policy carefully. This cookie policy and the privacy policy are interrelated. In fact, cookies can be used to collect certain data concerning the use of the City of Antwerp's online services. The privacy policy states what personal data City of Antwerp may collect from you, why it wants to collect this data, how it intends to use it and how it plans to handle it.
The City of Antwerp may amend the privacy and/or cookie policy at any time. This may happen, for example, in the connection with any changes to its services or applicable legislation. The amended terms will then be published on the relevant online services of the City of Antwerp and will apply from the time they are published.
About cookies
What are cookies?
Cookies are small data or text files that are installed on your computer or mobile device when you visit a website or use a (mobile) application. The cookie file contains a unique code that allows your browser to be recognised during your visit to the online service or on subsequent, repeated visits. Cookies may be placed by the server of the website or application you are visiting, as well as by third-party servers that may or may not be working together with that website or application. Cookies generally make interaction between the visitor and the website or application easier and faster and help the visitor navigate between different parts of a website or application. Cookies can also be used to make the content of a website or application more relevant to visitors by tailoring it to their personal tastes and needs.
What cookies are used for what on the City of Antwerp online services?
The cookies used on our online services can be divided up according to several criteria.
How long will the cookies last?
- Temporary cookies
Temporary cookies are only stored temporarily in your browser or application. Once you close and exit your browser or the application, those cookies are deleted. - Permanent cookies
Permanent cookies remain on your computer or mobile device even if you close the browser or application. Permanent cookies enable you to be recognised during subsequent visits to the website or application. Permanent cookies remain on your device until their expiry date is reached, until a new cookie is installed, or until you delete them in your browser, application or mobile device settings.
Who places and manages cookies?
- First-party cookies
First-party cookies are cookies that City of Antwerp manages and are specific to the City of Antwerp online service visited or used. - Third-party cookies
Third-party cookies are cookies managed and placed by a third party. This happens while visiting or using an online service provided by the City of Antwerp. Third-party cookies cause certain data relating to your visit to or your use of an online service provided by the City of Antwerp to be sent to third parties.
What are cookies for?
- Essential functional cookies
Essential functional cookies are cookies that are necessary in order to enable you to use the online services provided by the City of Antwerp properly. Among other things, these cookies are used: to remember the information that you enter or select on the various pages, so that you do not have to repeatedly enter or select all of your details or preferences; to store settings for optimal video playback, such as the desired buffer size and the screen resolution data; to read your browser settings in order to display our website as effectively as possible on your screen; to load the website evenly, keeping the site accessible and to enable you to interact with our websites. If you reject those cookies, certain (parts) of the websites will not work or not work as effectively. - Performance Analysis cookies
The City of Antwerp uses performance and analysis cookies to collect general information about how visitors use its online services. From the information thus collected, statistical analyses can be made. These statistics provide the City of Antwerp with an insight into how often its webpages are visited, where visitors spend the most time, and so on. This enables the City of Antwerp to make the structure, navigation and content of its online services as user-friendly as possible and to generally improve them. This information is also used to report on the performance of the City of Antwerp or in the context of surveys in which City of Antwerp participates. - Social media cookies
The City of Antwerp online services may contain embedded elements from third parties. This may include content stored by another party but displayed on, in or via the City of Antwerp online services. Furthermore, City of Antwerp content on City of Antwerp online services can be shared via social media using buttons. This may enable social media to set cookies via the City of Antwerp online services and collect data by that means. For further details about this, please see the statements these parties make about this on their own websites: Facebook, Google+/YouTube, LinkedIn, X, TikTok. Please note that these statements may change periodically. - Personalisation cookies
The City of Antwerp may also use cookies that allow it to make more targeted recommendations based on your use of the City of Antwerp online services. As a result, you will receive suggestions for programmes and other information based on your surfing behaviour on the City of Antwerp's online services. By doing so, we hope to introduce you to information you will find interesting and that you might not have immediately thought of on your own. - Other cookies
In this category are cookies that cannot be placed in any of the other categories of cookies. One example of those are cookies that can be used to create proprietary Web analytics and optimise sites. In addition to the performance analysis cookies mentioned above, other web analytics cookies may be used. These will have to be turned off, though, because they involve processing potentially identifiable personal data. This is not the case with the performance analysis cookies mentioned above. Using these cookies, statistics can be created from the information collected. These statistics provide an insight into how often the webpages are visited, where visitors spend the most time, etc. This enables the organisation to make the structure, navigation and content of its online services as user-friendly as possible and to generally improve them. - Unanticipated cookies
Because of the way the internet and websites or applications work, we may not always be aware of the cookies placed by third parties via our online services. This is the case for example when our webpages contain embedded elements: these are texts, documents, photos or videos that are stored by a third party, but which are displayed on, in or via our online services. If you come across cookies on our online services that fall into this category that we have not mentioned below, please let us know. Or you can contact the third party directly and ask what cookies they set and why, what the cookie's life span is and how they have protected your privacy.
How can you refuse or manage the use of cookies on City of Antwerp online services?
You can refuse or manage cookies in your browser settings. You can also delete all the cookies already installed on your computer or mobile device at any time. The following website describes how to refuse cookies on the most commonly used browsers: www.aboutcookies.org.