Malta Central uses as few cookies as it can get away with. There are two optional categories, not six, because there are only two real decisions to make and inventing more would be theatre.
Change your mind
Whatever you chose when you arrived, you can change it here, now, and as often as you like. Withdrawing is exactly as easy as agreeing was.
The three categories
What each one covers
- Necessary
- Always on and never asked about. This is the cookie that remembers your cookie choice, plus the session and security cookies that let a page load and a form submit safely. Turning these off would break the site, so there is no switch for them.
- Analytics
- Off unless you agree. Counts how many people read a page and which pages are worth improving. It measures pages, not people, and we do not use it to build a profile of you or sell anything to you.
- Partner links
- Off unless you agree. Records that a booking came from this site so the supplier credits us for it. It costs you nothing and changes no price. Refusing it means the links still work and we simply do not get paid.
The cookies themselves
Set by this site
- mc_consent
- Necessary. Stores your answer to the banner and nothing else: the two categories and a version number. First-party, one year, SameSite=Lax. If we change what the categories mean, the version changes and you are asked again. We will not assume you agreed to something you were never shown.
Third-party cookies need your agreement
- Google Analytics
- Analytics category. Measures page views and a small number of deliberate events, such as a click out to a partner or a newsletter signup. Nothing is sent until you allow the analytics category.
- Travelpayouts
- Partner links category. Attributes a booking to this site so we are credited for it. The script is not loaded at all unless you allow the category.
Everything is off until you agree
Google’s tags run in consent mode with storage for analytics and advertising set to denied before anything else on the page loads. That ordering matters: a tag that loads first and asks permission afterwards has already done the thing it was asking about. Your stored answer is read in the browser rather than on the server. A page served from cache still applies your choice, not the choice of whoever loaded it first.
Maps
Map tiles are served by OpenStreetMap. Loading a map means your browser requests images from openstreetmap.org, which involves your IP address reaching them. This is not a cookie, and we cannot gate it behind consent without breaking the map. It is disclosed here and in the privacy policy instead.
Blocking them yourself
Every browser can refuse or delete cookies from its own settings, and that overrides anything chosen here. Deleting the mc_consent cookie resets you to having made no choice, so the banner will ask again on your next visit.