What a cookie is
A cookie is a small value stored by your browser so a website can remember necessary state between requests. Similar technologies can also measure activity. Detailed analytics stays off until you agree; advertising measurement requires a separate provider-specific choice.
The Portal session cookie
After a successful login, Fractal Sounds sets a cookie named fractal_portal_session. It is required to keep you signed in and authorize access to licenses and protected downloads. It is HTTP-only, secure on HTTPS, limited to same-site use and expires after 30 days or when you sign out. The cookie contains a random session token, not your password or payment information.
Meta advertising measurement
The separate Meta choice is off by default and requires optional analytics to be enabled. If you agree, Meta Pixel measures visits to public product, collection and catalog pages, and may store _fbp and _fbc browser/ad identifiers. We do not load this pixel on Portal or checkout pages, enable automatic form matching, or supply your name, email, address or payment information. If server purchase reporting is configured, confirmed paid purchases can be sent to Meta with product, quantity, currency, value excluding taxes and shipping, browser user agent, and the consented browser/ad identifiers. Meta can use these signals for advertising measurement and optimization. Purchase identifiers are stable and opaque to prevent retry duplicates; purchases are not inferred from page visits.
Meta click context is retained locally for up to 30 days. Browser privacy signals and withdrawal through Cookie choices stop future browser collection and clear the Meta measurement cookies and local context. Server reporting uses the choice captured when you submit checkout; a later browser change cannot recall events already submitted. Retry payloads are removed when delivery completes or its 48-hour retry window ends. Shopping and account access do not require this choice.
Stripe checkout
Purchases are completed on Stripe-hosted checkout pages. Stripe may use cookies and similar technology for payment security, fraud prevention and checkout operation under Stripe's own privacy and cookie practices.
Embedded and linked services
Some pages link to or embed content from services such as YouTube or Google. Video embeds use YouTube's privacy-enhanced domain where implemented. Opening or interacting with an external service can allow that provider to process information under its own policy.
Anonymous daily page totals
We maintain a separate estimate of public page views to monitor site traffic and operation. It can run before you choose optional analytics. The request contains only a fixed counter signal: no page address, referrer, visitor or session identifier, account information, consent value or advertising identifier. It is sent without cookies. Only a date and a combined page-view total are saved, for up to 13 months, using calendar days in the America/Toronto time zone. No individual event history is kept and these counts are not sent to Google or linked to orders. Network information needed to deliver a web request may still be processed by our hosting provider separately for operation and security; it is not saved in this counter.
Known automated browsers, private pages, local administration, and browser Do Not Track or Global Privacy Control signals are excluded. “Refuse optional” also stops future anonymous page counting in this browser. Existing analytics refusals are respected unless you separately enable anonymous counts in “Manage cookies.” Use “Cookie choices” in the footer to change this setting. Only your preference is stored locally, not an identifier. Already combined totals cannot be linked back to you. Page totals are estimates, not unique visitors, and do not identify which advertisement caused a sale.
Analytics and advertising
The storefront can collect optional first-party analytics, and can load Google Analytics when configured, only after you choose “Allow analytics” or enable it in “Manage cookies.” Before that choice, the Google tag and detailed first-party analytics are blocked. When allowed, Fractal Sounds measures page views, traffic sources, product views, checkout starts and confirmed purchases without sending checkout email addresses or payment details. With analytics consent, the first known source, most recent non-direct source and most recent paid source may be kept in your browser for up to 30 days to connect a later purchase to an earlier visit. Source labels describe observed visits, not proof that advertising caused a purchase. If you also check the advertising measurement option, advertising storage and advertising measurement data may be used by Google to measure campaign results. This separate option is off by default. Personalized advertising remains disabled.
For consented purchases, our server may send a confirmed purchase event to Google Analytics using the browser's Analytics identifiers, transaction ID, products, amount and currency. It does not send your checkout email, payment details or form contents. Payment and order records are maintained separately to fulfill your purchase, whether or not you allow optional measurement.
Your controls
When Reddit measurement is enabled, a separate, unchecked Reddit option appears in Cookie choices. Only if you allow it together with analytics, we retain a Reddit ad click ID for up to 30 days and may send Reddit a confirmed purchase with that click ID, products, amount, currency, an opaque conversion ID and billing country. We request Limited Data Use and do not send your email, name, phone number, payment details or private checkout URL. Existing Google consent does not enable Reddit measurement. Browser privacy signals disable this option. Withdrawing it removes the saved browser click ID and stops future collection; it does not recall events already sent or purchases already queued at checkout.
Use “Cookie choices” in the footer to allow or withdraw optional analytics, or to disable anonymous counts. “Manage cookies” provides separate choices; “Save choices” applies them. Withdrawing analytics consent removes accessible Google Analytics cookies, first-party analytics identifiers and saved attribution, and reloads the page with the tag blocked. You can also change the separate advertising measurement choice here. Blocking the necessary Portal session cookie will prevent sign-in and protected downloads from working correctly, but it will not prevent browsing public product pages.