Cookie Statement
Vlerick collects and analyses information about your visit to our website via the placement of cookies in your browser. We use strictly necessary cookies for which we don’t require your consent. However, cookies that aren’t essential to run the site will only be placed in your browser after obtaining your consent. If you wish to determine which information to share with Vlerick, you can configure your cookie settings. Please note that some functionalities in our website could be altered if you do not consent to certain cookies.
1. What if this cookie policy does not answer all your questions?
Vlerick Business School (“VBS”) uses cookies and similar technologies to facilitate the use of www.vlerick.com and to improve the website’s functionality and user experience. This cookie policy also applies to all subdomains of .vlerick.com. By providing this document, VBS aims to provide you with clear information about what cookies are, for which purposes VBS uses them, how long they are retained on your device and how you can control your cookie preferences. If you have any questions about our use of cookies or other technologies, please email us at legal@vlerick.com.
2. Identification of the controller
Whenever you see a reference to "we" in this cookie policy, this actually refers to VBS:
- Vlerick Business School
- Reep 1, 9000 Ghent
- Company number: BE0424.244.049
The company VBS, as data controller, is responsible for the collection and use (or - as the law calls it - "processing") of your personal data as explained in this cookie policy.
3. General information about cookies
3.1 What are cookies?
A cookie is a text file placed in the browser of your computer or mobile device by a website's server when you consult a website. The use of cookies makes it possible to recognize visitors' browsers, with the aim of remembering information about you. The cookie usually contains the name of the server that placed the cookie, as well as a unique code that allows your browser to be recognized when you visit the website. It allows us to save certain settings, such as your choice of language, to make your visit to the website faster and easier.
Cookies can also be used to make content or advertisements on a website more relevant to visitors and tailored to their personal tastes and needs. Certain cookies may be set by a third party. If you do not want a website to place cookies on your computer, you can change your browser settings. This is further explained in this cookie policy.
3.2 What types of cookies exist?
Strictly necessary cookies
These cookies are necessary for the website to function and cannot be switched off in our systems. They are usually only set in response to actions made by you which amount to a request for services, such as setting your privacy preferences, logging in, remembering language settings or completing forms. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will then not work. These cookies do not store any personally identifiable information.
Performance and analytics cookies
We use analytics cookies to measure visits to our website. This gives us a better idea about which sections are the most relevant to our visitors and what the most popular content is, so that we can tailor our website to the people who use it. We use third-party software from Google Analytics.
IP addresses are registered for use by our functional and analytics cookies if you have given consent; the resulting statistics and reports are not linked to personal data.
Functional cookies
These cookies enable the website to provide enhanced functionality and personalization. They may be set by us or by third party providers whose services we have added to our pages. If you do not allow these cookies then some or all of these services may not function properly.
Advertising/targeting cookies
Our website may also send out cookies from other organisations so that we can deliver offers and information that is of real use to you.
With your consent, we would like to show you information on our (and other) websites that is more relevant to you and your interests. This is why we want to try to assess what catches your interest and what doesn’t. Based on the pages you visit on our website, you will be shown different information to that shown to other visitors, making our website more relevant to you.
To display relevant offers, we use 'DoubleClick by Google', Google Analytics, Google AdWords, facebook, youtube, Bing en LinkedIn. We show these offers on the VBS website, on other organisations’ websites and when using Google services.
First-party cookies and third-party cookies
There is also a difference between first party-cookies and third-party cookies.
First-party cookies are created by the website you're visiting and store information to enhance your experience on that specific site. Third-party cookies, on the other hand, are generated by external domains, often for advertising purposes, and track your online activity across different websites. While first-party cookies are directly related to the site you're on, third-party cookies involve external entities gathering information about your browsing habits across multiple sites.
Social media cookies
When you are logged in to our website, you can share various articles and videos using the social media buttons. To ensure that these buttons work properly, we use cookies from the following social media platforms. We need to ask your permission to use these cookies.
With these cookies, these platforms can recognise you when you want to share something from our site. For more information about the cookies the social media platforms place on your computer and the data these cookies collect, you can read the cookies statement on their websites. Please be aware that these statements can change at any time. The website of VBS has no influence over this.
VBS is active on the following social media platforms: Facebook, Instagram, Google+, YouTube, LinkedIn, Twitter and Pinterest.
3.3 How can you disable cookies?
If you wish to block the placement of cookies on your device, you can do so via the settings of the browser you are using:
• Opera
• Firefox
• Safari
Please note that disabling cookies may result in certain graphical elements or applications on the website working less well. VBS will make every effort to ensure the proper functioning of the website. However, certain parts of the website require the use of cookies.
In any case, we will ask your consent again after 1 year for the cookies for which you have given your consent or if our cookie policy changes.
4. Which cookies does vbs use?
4.1 Strictly necessary cookies
| Cookie | Provider | Type | Description | Retention period |
| AEC | Third party | This cookie ensures that requests within a browser session are made by the user and not by other sites. These cookies prevent malicious sites from impersonating a user without the user's knowledge. | 6 Months | |
| lidc | Third party | Cookie is used to provide load balancing functionality. | 1 Day | |
| _vis_opt_exp_{CAMPAIGNID}_goal_{GOALID} | VWO | First party | This cookie is created when a campaign goal is triggered. This cookie, when created, will always have a value of 1. | 100 Days |
| _vis_opt_test_cookie | VWO | First party | This cookie is created to detect if the cookies are enabled on the visitor’s browser or not. It also helps in tracking the number of browser sessions a visitor has gone through. The value of this cookie is always 1. | Expires on browser close |
| _vis_opt_exp_{CAMPAIGNID}_combi | VWO | First party | This cookie is created when a visitor is chosen for a particular variation for a test. This cookie makes sure that visitors see the same variation when they revisit the page in the future. Here the Control has a value of 1, Variation #1 has a value of 2, Variation #2 has a value of 3, and so on. | 100 Days |
| _vis_opt_exp_{CAMPAIGNID}_exclude | VWO | First party | This cookie is created when a visitor has been excluded from a Test Campaign due to the traffic percentage specifications. The value is always 1. | 100 Days |
| _vis_opt_exp_{CAMPAIGNID}_split | VWO | First party | This cookie is created when one of the variations is chosen for the visitor, but the visitor is not yet redirected to the variation page. It exists so that VWO can verify that the variation page corresponds to the chosen variation after landing on the page. The value is >=2 (as 1 corresponds to Control and it’s not created in case the Control is chosen) | 100 Days |
| _vis_opt_s | VWO | First party | This cookie tracks sessions created for a visitor, i.e., the number of times the browser was closed and reopened. The value is >=1, followed by a pipe sign. For example, the value of 2 indicates that the visitor restarted the browser once while 3 means twice. | 100 Days |
| _vis_opt_out | VWO | First party | This cookie indicates that the visitor should not be made part of any campaign. Its value is 1. | 10 Years |
| _vwo_uuid | VWO | First party | This cookie generates a unique id for every visitor and is used for the report segmentation feature in VWO, and it also allows you to view data in a more refined manner. | 10 Years |
| _vwo_uuid_{CAMPAIGNID} | VWO | First party | This cookie is created for each cross-domain campaign. It generates a unique id for every visitor and is used for the report segmentation feature in VWO, and it also allows you to view data in a more refined manner. | 10 Years |
| _vwo_ds | VWO | First party | This cookie stores persistent visitor-level data for VWO Insights. | Depends on the retention period of the account |
| _vwo_sn | VWO | First party | This cookie stores session-level information. | 30 Minutes and reset again to 30 minutes on visitor activity |
| _vwo_uuid_v2 | VWO | First party | This cookie calculates unique traffic on a website. | 366 Days |
| _vis_opt_exp_{CAMPAIGNID}_combi_choose | VWO | First party | This cookie stores the chosen combination. It’s a temporary cookie that gets deleted when the campaign changes are applied. | Persists until campaign changes are applied |
| _vwo_referrer | VWO | First party | This cookie stores referral info allowing VWO to identify the original Traffic source in case of the Split URL campaign. NOTE: This cookie is created only for Split URL campaigns but can be read by all campaign types. | 15 Seconds |
| _vwo | VWO | First party | This cookie is a jar of all the cookies. It is currently created only for the Safari browser. In the future, it would replace all the cookies. The actual expiry of a cookie doesn’t matter as it stores the expiry of cookies set in it and keeps on expiring them. | Expires in 2096 Years |
| pushcrew_opt_out | VWO | First party | This cookie is used for opting out. | 10000 Days |
| pshcrw_update_subId | VWO | First party | This cookie is used for retrying the storage of subscriptions with VWO Engage’s Server. Used only in cases when the server is not reachable due to network issues. | 10000 Days |
| _vwo_global_opt_out | VWO | First party | This cookie is persisted when a visitor opts out of VWO on all websites in a given browser. | 100 Days |
| _vwo_ssm | VWO | First party | This cookie is used for testing and is created only on sites that use the HTTP protocol. This is used to check if VWO can create cookies on them, post which this cookie is deleted. | 3650 Days |
4.2 Functional cookies
| Cookie | Provider | Type | Description | Retention period |
| SOCS | Third party | It is used to store a user’s state regarding their cookies choices. | 13 months | |
| CONSENT | Third party | It is used to store a user’s state regarding their cookie choices. | 2 years | |
| Li_gc | Third party | It is used to store a user’s state regarding their cookie choices. | 6 months | |
| bcookie | Third party | Cookie is used to store browser preferences. | 1 year | |
| lang | Third party | Used to remember a user's language setting to ensure LinkedIn.com displays in the language selected by the user in their settings. | Session | |
| Li_mc | Third party | Used as a temporary cache to avoid database lookups for a member's consent for use of non-essential cookies and used for having consent information on the client side to enforce consent on the client side. | 6 months | |
| wd | Third party | Used to read screen resolution. | 1 week | |
| Presence | Third party | Used to contain the user’s chat state. | Session | |
| PREF | Youtube | Third party | Stores your video player preferences for embedded YouTube videos. | 230 days |
| Dpr | Third party | Used to read screen resolutions. | 1 week | |
| __Secure-YEC | Youtube | Third party | Stores the user’s video player preferences using embedded YouTube videos. | 13 months |
| Liap | Third party | Used by non-www.domains to denote the logged in status of a member. | 1 year | |
| S_cc | Third party | Used to determine if cookies are enabled for Adobe Analytics. | Session |
4.3 Analytics cookies
| Cookie | Provider | Type | Description | Retention period |
| _ga | Google Analytics | First party | This cookie is used to store information about how visitors use the website and helps create an analytical report on how the website is doing. The data collected, including the number of visitors, the source they came from and the pages remain anonymous. | 1 day |
| _ga_* | Google Analytics | First party | This cookie is used to track and count pageviews. | 1 year |
| __Secure-ENID | Third party | To secure digitally signed and encrypted data from the unique Google ID and store the most recent login time that Google uses to identify visitors, prevent fraudulent use of login data and protect visitor data from unauthorized parties. This can also be used for targeting purposes to display relevant and personalized advertising content. | 1 year | |
| Li_sugr | Third party | This cookie is used to store and track a visitor’s identity. | 3 months | |
| AnalyticsSyncHistory | Third party | This cookie is used to store and track visits across websites. | 1 month | |
| _fbp | First party | This cookie is used to display advertisements when either on Facebook or on a digital platform powered by Facebook advertising, after visiting the website. | 3 months | |
| MUID | Microsoft Clarity | First party | This cookie is used to store and track visits across websites. | 1 year |
| _hjAbsoluteSessionInProgress | HotJar | First party | Is used to track website traffic and performance. | Session |
| _hjFirstSeen | HotJar | First party | Identifies a new user's first session on a website, indicating whether or not Hotjar's seeing this user for the first time. | Session |
| _hjSessionUser_* | HotJar | First party | Hotjar cookie that is set when a user first lands on a page with the Hotjar script. It is used to persist the Hotjar User ID, unique to that site on the browser. This ensures that behavior in subsequent visits to the same site will be attributed to the same user ID. | 1 year |
| _hjSession_* | HotJar | First party | A cookie that holds the current session data. This ensues that subsequent requests within the session window will be attributed to the same Hotjar session. | Session |
| _hjIncludedInSessionSample_* | HotJar | First party | Is used to track website traffic and performance. | Session |
| Lms_analytics | Third party | Used to identify LinkedIn Members off LinkedIn for analytics. | 1 month | |
| VISITOR_INFO1_LIVE | Youtube | Third party | This cookie is used as a unique identifier to track viewing of videos. | 180 days |
| DV | Third party | This cookie is used to collect information about how visitors use the website and use the information to compile reports and to help improve the website. The cookie collect information in an anonymous form, including the number of visitors to the website, where visitors have come to the website from and the pages they visited. | Session | |
| FPLC | Google Tag Manager | First party | Registers a unique ID that is used to generate statistical data on how the visitor uses the website. | 1 day |
| FPID | Google Analytics | First party | Enables server side tagging in Google Analytics. | 1 day |
| FPAU | Google Analytics | First party | Registers a unique ID that is used to generate statistical data on how the visitor uses the website. | 3 months |
| S_sq | Third party | Used to store information about the previous link that was clicked on by the user by Adobe Analytics. | Session | |
| S_tslv | Third party | Used to retain and fetch time since last visit in Adobe Analytics | 6 months | |
| S_ppv | Third party | Used by Adobe Analytics to retain and fetch what percentage of a page was viewed. | Session | |
| S_pltp | Third party | Provides page name value (URL) for use by Adobe Analytics. | Session | |
| S_ips | Third party | Tracks percentage of page viewed. | Session | |
| S_tp | Third party | Tracks percentage of page viewed. | Session | |
| Aam_uuid | Third party | Stores a unique identifyer. | 1 month | |
| _sp_id.* | Mediafin | First party | This cookie is used to store an anonymous ID | 1 year |
4.4 Marketing and advertisement cookies
| Cookie | Provider | Type | Description | Retention period |
| UserMatchHistory | Third party | This cookie is used to provide ad delivery or retargeting. | 1 month | |
| Lms_ads | Third party | Used to identify LinkedIn Members off LinkedIn for advertising. | 1 month | |
| IDE | DoubleClick | Third party | Ads targeting cookie for DoubleClick. | 2 years |
| xs | Third party | Used to store a unique session ID. | 3 months | |
| Fr | Third party | Used to provide ad delivery or retargeting. | 3 months | |
| Datr | Third party | Used to provide fraud detection. | 2 years | |
| Sb | Third party | Used to store browser details. | 2 years | |
| C-user | Third party | Used to store a unique user ID. | 1 month | |
| YSC | Youtube | Third party | Through this cookie, YouTube collects user data through videos embedded in websites, which is aggregated with profile data from other Google services in order to display targeted advertising to web visitors across a broad range of their own and other websites. | Session |
| Oo | Third party | Allows you to opt-out of receiving ads on Meta based on your activities on third-party websites. | 5 years | |
| Tfpsi | Teads | First party | Registers user behaviour and navigation on the website, and any interaction with active campaigns. This is used for optimizing advertisement and for efficient retargeting. | Session |
| Sa-user-id | Stackadapt | Third party | Used to track visitors on multiple websites, in order to present relevant advertisement based on the visitor's preferences. | 1 year |
| Sa-user-id-v2 | Stackadapt | Third party | Used to track visitors on multiple websites, in order to present relevant advertisement based on the visitor's preferences. | 1 year |
| Sa-user-id-v3 | Stackadapt | Third party | Used to track visitors on multiple websites, in order to present relevant advertisement based on the visitor's preferences. | 1 year |
| _ttp | TikTok | Third party | To measure and improve the performance of your advertising campaigns and to personalize the user's experience (including ads) on TikTok. | 13 months |
| _tt_enable_cookie | TikTok | Third party | Used to identify a visitor. This tracking is used to evaluate and measure how different campaigns and marketing strategies perform on TikTok. | 13 months |
| AMCVS_* | Adobe experience cloud | First party | Sets and stores a unique ID to store and track interaction. | Session |
| AMCV_* | Adobe experience cloud | First party | Stores the users’ last visit to the website. | 2 years |
| _uetvid | Bing Ads | First party | Stores and tracks visits across websites. | 13 months |
| _uetsid | Bing Ads | First party | Stores and tracks visits across websites. | 1 day |
5. Changes to this cookie policy
By continuing to use this website, you acknowledge that you have read the terms of this cookie policy and agree to our use of cookies as set out above (unless you have expressly stated otherwise). We may update this cookie policy from time to time. Any changes we make to our cookie policy in the future will be posted on this page. Please check back regularly for any updates or changes to this cookie policy.