Gombea Cookie Policy
This Cookie Policy explains how Gombea uses cookies and similar technologies when you use our website and related services.
It should be read together with our Privacy Policy.
Gombea is an independent information aggregation platform. We are not a government service and are not affiliated with, operated by, or endorsed by any government institution, political party, candidate or campaign.
1. What Are Cookies?
Cookies are small pieces of information stored on your device when you visit a website.
They can help websites:
- remember that you are signed in
- remember preferences
- maintain security
- understand how services are used
- measure performance
- provide and measure advertising
Gombea may also use technologies that perform similar functions, including:
- browser local storage
- session storage
- device identifiers
- pixels
- tags
- software development kits (SDKs)
- similar browser or application technologies
In this policy, we sometimes refer to these collectively as cookies and similar technologies.
2. How Gombea Uses Cookies
Gombea may use cookies and similar technologies for four main purposes:
Strictly Necessary
To operate and secure the service.
Preferences
To remember choices you make.
Analytics
To understand how Gombea is being used and improve the product.
Advertising
To deliver, measure and, where you have consented, personalise advertising.
Not every category will necessarily be active at all times.
The technologies used by Gombea may change as the platform develops. This policy and our consent controls will be updated where appropriate.
3. Strictly Necessary Cookies
Some technologies are necessary for Gombea to function correctly.
They may be used for purposes such as:
- authentication
- maintaining a signed-in session
- account security
- fraud prevention
- load balancing
- protecting forms
- remembering privacy choices
- maintaining essential application state
These technologies cannot generally be disabled through Gombea's cookie controls because the service may not function correctly without them.
Where applicable law permits, consent is not requested for technologies that are strictly necessary to provide a service requested by the user.
4. Preference Cookies
Preference technologies allow Gombea to remember choices you have made.
Examples may include:
- map preferences
- selected map layers
- display preferences
- language
- theme
- accessibility preferences
- previously selected geographic area
- dismissed interface messages
Where possible, some preferences may be stored locally on your device rather than associated with your Gombea account.
5. Analytics Cookies
With consent where required, Gombea may use analytics technologies to understand how people use the platform.
Analytics information may help us understand:
- which features are used
- which screens are visited
- how users navigate the map
- application performance
- errors and crashes
- approximate session duration
- general device and browser information
- which features users find useful
- where usability can be improved
We use this information to operate and improve Gombea.
Analytics should be configured to collect only information reasonably necessary for these purposes.
Where analytics cookies or similar technologies require consent, they will not be activated until that consent has been provided.
6. Advertising Cookies
Gombea is primarily supported through advertising.
Advertising technologies may be used to:
- display advertisements
- limit how often an advertisement is shown
- measure advertisement impressions
- measure clicks
- detect invalid advertising activity
- understand advertising performance
- provide contextual advertising
- provide personalised advertising where permitted and consented to
Advertising partners may use cookies, advertising identifiers and similar technologies when delivering or measuring advertisements.
Where required by applicable law, personalised advertising technologies will not operate until the appropriate consent has been obtained.
You may still see advertisements if you decline personalised advertising.
Those advertisements may instead be selected using contextual information such as the content being viewed rather than a behavioural advertising profile.
7. Political Content and Advertising Profiles
Gombea provides information about politics, representatives, elections and government.
This makes responsible treatment of browsing behaviour particularly important.
Gombea does not consider ordinary interactions such as:
- viewing a politician
- viewing a political party
- searching for a representative
- viewing an electoral area
- reading political news
- exploring a political map
to mean that a user supports a particular politician, party or political position.
We do not intend to create political-opinion profiles from ordinary Gombea browsing behaviour for behavioural advertising purposes.
Where advertising technologies are used, they should be configured consistently with this principle and applicable legal and platform requirements.
8. Location and Cookies
Gombea may use location information, with permission, to identify your county, constituency or ward and provide relevant map information.
Browser cookies are not the same as device location permissions.
Giving Gombea permission to access your location for map functionality does not automatically constitute consent to use that location for personalised advertising.
Location permission will not be requested solely for advertising.
See our Privacy Policy for more information about how Gombea handles location information.
9. Google Technologies
Gombea may use Google services for purposes such as:
- analytics
- application services
- advertising
- advertising measurement
Google technologies may use cookies, device identifiers or similar technologies depending on the service and platform.
Where required, Google advertising or analytics technologies will only be activated after appropriate consent has been obtained.
The specific Google products used by Gombea may change as the platform develops.
Our consent controls and this policy will be updated where necessary to reflect material changes.
10. Meta / Facebook Technologies
Gombea may use technologies provided by Meta where these are appropriate for features such as measurement, analytics or other integrations.
If Meta technologies are introduced, their use will be disclosed appropriately.
Where consent is legally required, optional Meta technologies will not be activated until that consent has been provided.
Gombea will not deliberately send information to Meta beyond what is necessary for an enabled service and permitted by applicable law and platform requirements.
11. Other Third-Party Technologies
Gombea may use other trusted service providers for purposes such as:
- security
- infrastructure
- analytics
- error monitoring
- advertising
- content delivery
- application functionality
Some providers may set or access their own cookies or similar technologies.
Where required, these technologies will be identified through Gombea's consent-management system.
12. Cookie Duration
Cookies may be:
Session Cookies
These normally expire when you close your browser or end a session.
Persistent Cookies
These remain for a defined period or until they are deleted.
We aim to retain cookies only for as long as reasonably necessary for their purpose.
The precise duration depends on the technology and service being used.
Where appropriate, Gombea's cookie-management interface may provide more detailed information about individual technologies and their duration.
13. Your Choices
Where optional cookies require consent, Gombea will provide controls allowing you to make choices about their use.
Depending on the technologies enabled, options may include:
Accept All
Allow permitted optional analytics and advertising technologies.
Reject Optional
Use Gombea without optional cookies that require consent.
Manage Preferences
Choose which optional categories you allow.
Rejecting optional cookies should not prevent access to Gombea's core political-information features.
Some optional functionality may operate differently when particular technologies are disabled.
14. Changing Your Mind
Where processing is based on consent, you can change your preferences later.
Gombea should provide an accessible:
Cookie Settings
or:
Privacy Settings
control.
Changing your preference will affect future use of the relevant technologies.
It may not automatically remove information previously processed lawfully before consent was withdrawn.
15. Browser Controls
Most browsers also allow you to:
- view cookies
- delete cookies
- block cookies
- restrict third-party cookies
- clear site data
These controls are managed by your browser rather than Gombea.
Blocking all cookies may affect features that rely on strictly necessary storage or authentication.
16. Mobile Applications
Native mobile applications may use technologies that do not technically operate as browser cookies.
These can include:
- advertising identifiers
- application storage
- SDKs
- analytics identifiers
- device-level permissions
Where relevant, Gombea applies the same underlying privacy principles to these technologies.
Device operating systems may also provide controls for advertising identifiers, location permissions and tracking.
See the Gombea Privacy Policy for further information.
17. Consent Records
Where Gombea asks for cookie or tracking consent, we may retain a record of:
- whether consent was given
- which categories were selected
- when the preference was recorded
- the version of the consent information presented
This helps us remember your choices and demonstrate that privacy preferences are being respected.
The information used to remember your consent choice may itself be considered strictly necessary.
18. Do Not Track and Similar Signals
Browsers and devices may provide privacy preference mechanisms.
Where Gombea is legally required to recognise a particular privacy signal, we will do so.
We may also voluntarily support recognised privacy preference signals where technically appropriate.
19. Changes to This Cookie Policy
We may update this Cookie Policy when:
- Gombea introduces new features
- service providers change
- advertising or analytics technologies change
- legal requirements change
- our privacy practices change
The latest version will show the date it was last updated.
Where a change materially affects consent choices, users may be asked to review their preferences again.
20. Contact Us
If you have questions about cookies, tracking technologies or privacy at Gombea, contact:
Gombea
Email: [email protected]
For more information about how Gombea handles personal information, please read our Privacy Policy.
Independent Platform Notice
Gombea is an independent information aggregation platform.
It is not affiliated with, operated by, or endorsed by the Government of Kenya, any county government, political party, candidate, campaign, Parliament, electoral authority or other public institution unless a specific relationship is expressly stated.