and the answer is?
It normally doesn’t.
This information comes from http://www.ico.org.uk/for_organisations/privacy_and_electronic_communications/the_guide/cookies
And I quote:
“Some cookies can be exempted from informed consent under certain conditions if they are not used for additional purposes. These cookies include cookies used to keep track of a user’s input when filling online forms or as a shopping card, also known as session-id cookies, multimedia player session cookies and user interface customisation cookies, eg language preference cookies to remember the language selected by the user.
First party analytics cookies are not likely to create a privacy risk if websites provide clear information about the cookies to users and privacy safeguards, eg a user friendly mechanism to opt out from any data collection and where they ensure that identifiable information is anonymised.”
The default Zen Cart installation only uses session-ids to hold your information for the shopping cart before logging in or creating an account which logs you in. Also, this covers Google Analytics so the addition of that does not require setting up cookie notification.
If you are still worried about it, you could put a bit on your privacy statement saying that your cart cookies are exempt from informed consent because they are session-ids only.
If you have modified the default Zen Cart…
Then the mods could be using cookies that do apply and so then you may need to worry about this issue. There is a plugin for that located at http://www.zen-cart.com/downloads.php?do=file&id=1476.
To find out what cookies your site has, use these instructions with the appropriate browser:
Firefox (Classic): Tools Menu > Page Info > Security Tab > View Cookies
OR Firefox (New): Firefox Menu > Options > Privacy > Remove Individual Cookies (select your website)
Internet Explorer: Press F12 > Cache Menu > View Cookie Information
Chrome: Spanner icon > Tools > Developer Tools > Cookies
Safari: Settings menu > Preferences > Privacy tab > Details button > search for the current site domain in the search box
Opera: Settings menu > Preferences > Advanced tab > Cookies Menu > Manage Cookies (find your site)
It’s best not to make assumptions.
I have to say that there can be surprises. When I checked a client’s site as I was writing the article, I found 4 extra cookies! The last developer left behind some unnamed stuff, a mystery! So now, excuse me, while I try to figure out what the heck he did!
ADDENDUM
Well, it was a surprise – I’ve discovered the cookies were from Google Analytics – named _utma, _utmb, _utmc and _utmz. So those also do not store personal information and are not considered to be a problem. More fun facts!