Our use of 'cookies' and your privacy

Subscribers may sign in with or without using ‘cookies’.

Please Note: Institutions with referring URL access to OED Online need to sign in with ‘cookies’.

What is a cookie?

Cookies are small files that we create to store information on your computer.

• We do not use cookies to track what other sites you have visited.
• We do not look at or track any personal or confidential information about you.
• We do make use of cookies to enable authorization control for online subscriptions.
• We delete all our cookies when you click ‘Sign Out’ or quit your browser.

There are four cookies used in our system:

Please Note: You are not required to accept ‘cookies’ to use this site as a subscriber, unless your access is via a referring URL. If you choose not to accept them, please click the alternative sign-in link on the sign-in page. If you do not accept cookies, the only way you can sign out is to quit your browser.

Cookie Problems:

If you keep seeing the sign-in page and can't get past it, here are some likely explanations:

You are not accepting cookies.
Make sure that your browser's preferences are set to accept cookies.

You are using a program on your computer that automatically deletes cookies
Two such programs for the Macintosh are ‘Cookie Cutter’ and ‘WebFree’. You will need to create an exception for OED Online.

The date is set incorrectly on your computer.
This confuses our cookies (they have expiration dates). Check to see that the date is set accurately.

Your browser does not support cookies.
You will need to upgrade it.

You are accessing OED Online via a ‘proxy server’ that is deleting cookies automatically.
You should contact your network administrator to determine whether your institution's proxy server is the source of the trouble.

If you still have problems, please contact us.