Controversial European Union Cookie Law

A new law that will go into effect on the 25th of May 2011 will require all websites hosted in the European Union to obtain explicit permission before storing persistent cookies on the visitor’s computer.

This controversial legislation will greatly affect the operation of most websites hosted in the EU. It will also affect SquirrelMail and NutsMail email systems, since they both use cookies as part of their functionality. For example, the login_auto plugin, which remembers the visitor’s username and password, stores this information in a persistent cookie.

The new version of NutsMail (4.0) is fully compliant with the new European Union law and includes a mechanism that obtains visitor’s permission for cookie usage. The mechanism is disabled by default and can be enabled by the EU companies in the NutsMail administration panel.

Upgrading to NutsMail 4.0 will be free for clients with active NutsMail accounts. If you host your website in the EU, we strongly suggest that you upgrade to the new version of NutsMail before the 25th of May to avoid any possible legal problems.

NutsMail 4.0 is still in beta testing stages. If you would like to be notified when it’s ready for download, send us a note using our contact form.

To read more on the new cookie legislation, click here.