Cookies and similar technologies

Draft: this page is awaiting review by a solicitor. It describes the website as built on 12 October 2026, and we will check every statement against the live site before launch.

The Tying The Knot website sets one cookie, and only if you sign in to your account. It writes nothing else to your browser's storage. It has no analytics and no advertising, and its pages load nothing from other companies' servers, so there is no cookie banner and nothing for you to accept or refuse. The example invitations are different: they are separate sites with their own behaviour, and you only reach them if you choose to.

What are cookies and similar technologies?

A cookie is a small file that a website asks your browser to keep, so the site can recognise you on the next page or the next visit.

Similar technologies do the same job in other ways:

• local storage and session storage: space in your browser that a website can write to;
• tracking pixels: tiny images that report a visit;
• scripts from analytics and advertising companies;
• device fingerprinting: building a profile of you from your device's settings.

The Irish rules cover all of these, not only cookies. They are about storing information on your device, or reading information already stored there, whatever tool does it.

What does the Tying The Knot website do?

• One cookie, only when you sign in. Signing in to your account sets one cookie, which keeps you signed in on that device. It holds a random code and nothing about you, it is strictly necessary for your account to work, and signing out removes it. Your session ends 30 days after you last use it. If you never sign in, you get no cookie.
• Nothing in your browser's storage. The site does not use local storage or session storage.
• No analytics. We have not installed any tool that counts visitors, follows which pages you read or records whether you play or pause a film.
• No advertising or social media tools. There are no pixels, buttons or plug-ins from advertising or social media companies.
• Nothing from other companies' servers. Pages, scripts, style sheets, pictures, films and typefaces all come from tyingtheknot.ie.

The site's typeface is built into the site and served from tyingtheknot.ie with everything else. Your browser never contacts Google or any other font company to show you a page, so no font company learns that you visited. The software the site is built with, Next.js, says that fonts handled this way are served from the same domain as the site, with no requests sent to Google by the browser (Next.js documentation, checked October 2026).

The early-access form

The get started page has a form where you can leave your email address, and your wedding month if you wish, to hear when ordering opens. When you send it, your browser passes those details to tyingtheknot.ie and they are emailed to us through an email service. The form sets no cookie and saves nothing in your browser.

The tick box on that form is your agreement to be emailed. It is a separate matter from cookies. What we do with your details, how long we keep them and your rights over them are in the privacy notice.

The example invitations are separate sites

Each example invitation has its own address, such as banns-laura-and-conor.vercel.app. Your browser contacts one only when you choose to: by pressing "Open the invitation", which opens it in a new tab, or "Try it in the phone", which shows it inside the example's page. Nothing is loaded from an example until you do.

This policy covers tyingtheknot.ie, not the examples. So that you know before you open one, here is what an example does at the time of writing:

• loads its typefaces from Google Fonts, so Google receives your device's address when it does;
• shows a map in its travel planner, with map pictures loaded from OpenStreetMap's servers, which receive your device's address too (OpenStreetMap Foundation privacy policy);
• remembers the airport you choose to fly from and the travel dates you pick, in your browser's local storage, so they are still there if you come back. They stay on your device, and the example does not send them anywhere;
• in some examples, shows a YouTube thumbnail for the couple's song, loaded from Google's servers, and loads YouTube's player only if you press play. The player is YouTube's own service and may set its own cookies (Google privacy policy);
• sets no cookies of its own.

The RSVP forms in the examples are demonstrations. Nothing you type into them is sent anywhere.

What would change this?

If we ever add analytics, advertising or any service from another company, this page changes first.

For analytics, the rule we have set ourselves is that the tool must set no cookie, use no local storage and build no fingerprint of your device. It must count in aggregate only, with nothing that follows you from one visit to the next. We would tell you here before it started, give you a way to opt out and have an Irish solicitor check it first. We would not tell you that no consent is needed simply because it only produces totals.

Anything that is not strictly necessary and does store or read information on your device, such as an advertising or social media tool, would be switched on only after you agree. Carrying on browsing would not count as agreeing, and no box would be ticked for you.

When ordering opens, signing in to your account will need a cookie or similar technology that the service cannot work without. The rules allow that kind without asking. The Data Protection Commission gives a shopping basket's session cookie as an example. We will list each one on this page before it starts, and we will say what the invitation sites we make for couples use.

What does the law say?

The Irish rules are in regulation 5 of S.I. 336/2011 (the European Communities (Electronic Communications Networks and Services) (Privacy and Electronic Communications) Regulations 2011). Regulation 5(3) says a website needs your consent before it stores information on your device, or reads information already stored there. Regulation 5(5) allows two exceptions: storage whose only purpose is carrying a communication over a network, and storage that is strictly necessary to provide a service you have explicitly asked for.

The Data Protection Commission (DPC) published guidance on how this works in April 2020. Among other things, it says:

• Analytics cookies need your consent. The DPC's FAQ on analytics cookies gives the same answer.
• Continuing to browse, or scrolling, is not consent.
• Pre-ticked boxes do not count.
• Session cookies for a shopping basket, and cookies that record a language preference, need no consent.
• Device fingerprints made by storing or reading information on your device need consent too.

The guidance also says that first-party analytics limited to aggregated statistics, with clear information and a way to opt out, is unlikely to be a priority for DPC enforcement. That is a statement about enforcement, and the rules themselves have no exemption for analytics.

We use none of these tools on tyingtheknot.ie, so there is nothing to ask your consent for and we do not show a cookie banner.

How can you check?

You can look for yourself. Open your browser's developer tools (in most browsers, press F12) and find the section called Application or Storage. Under Cookies, Local storage and Session storage, you should see nothing for tyingtheknot.ie. The Network tab lists every address a page contacts as it loads. On any page except an example you have opened, you should see tyingtheknot.ie and nothing else.

Contact

If you have a question about this page, or you think something on this website does not match it, email hello@tyingtheknot.ie or use the contact page. For how we handle personal information, your rights and how to complain to the Data Protection Commission, see the privacy notice.

Sources

Each source was last checked on 12 October 2026.

• Data Protection Commission, Guidance note on cookies and other tracking technologies, April 2020, which sets out regulation 5(3) and 5(5).
• Data Protection Commission, FAQ on consent for analytics cookies, undated.
• Next.js documentation, Font optimization.
• OpenStreetMap Foundation privacy policy and Google privacy policy, for the companies the examples contact.