What does cnn.com track?
Before any consent, cnn.com loaded 5 tracking companies and set 6 advertising or analytics cookies.
That's more tracking companies than 78% of the 2,450 sites we scanned.
Scanned October 2, 2026 from Germany, loading edition.cnn.com once and clicking nothing. How we scan
- Tracking companies
- 5
- Tracking cookies
- 6
- Third-party hosts
- 32
- Cookies in total
- 28
Consent banner
The page loaded OneTrust, a consent management platform. Everything below was recorded before anyone answered it. 5 tracking companies still loaded while it was unanswered.
Companies contacted before consent
4 of the 13 companies it contacted before consent were unclassified.
- Google Ads9 requestsAdvertising
securepubads.g.doubleclick.net, pagead2.googlesyndication.com, tpc.googlesyndication.com, pubads.g.doubleclick.net
- Quantcast2 requestsAdvertising
secure.quantserve.com, rules.quantcount.com
- Cxense (Piano)4 requestsAnalytics
cdn.cxense.com, id.cxense.com, comcluster.cxense.com
- Scorecard Research (Comscore)2 requestsAnalytics
sb.scorecardresearch.com
- Optimizely1 requestAnalytics
cdn.optimizely.com
Other third parties (content delivery, consent, functional, unclassified)
- mediamelon.com4 requestsUnclassified
beacons-wbd.mediamelon.com, register.mediamelon.com
- brightline.tv3 requestsUnclassified
events.brightline.tv, cdn-media.brightline.tv
- ml314.com2 requestsUnclassified
cdn.ml314.com, vi.ml314.com
- max.com2 requestsUnclassified
fly.live.cnn.eu.prd.media.max.com
- OneTrust2 requestsConsent banner
cdn.cookielaw.org, cookies-data.onetrust.io
- Stripe6 requestsFunctional
js.stripe.com, m.stripe.network, m.stripe.com
- Google6 requestsFunctional
accounts.google.com, fonts.googleapis.com, imasdk.googleapis.com, fonts.gstatic.com
- Piano4 requestsFunctional
experience.piano.io, cdn.tinypass.com, c2.piano.io, buy.tinypass.com
Cookies set before consent
The longest-lived tracking cookie it set was _pcus, from Piano, lasting about 13 months.
| Cookie | Purpose | Set by | Lasts |
|---|---|---|---|
| _pcus | Advertising | cnn.com | 13 months |
| cX_G | Advertising | cnn.com | 13 months |
| gckp | Advertising | cxense.com (third party) | 12 months |
| __pat | Analytics | cnn.com | 30 days |
| __pvi | Analytics | cnn.com | 1 day |
| cX_P | Analytics | cnn.com | 13 months |
| _OT_sm | Unclassified | edition.cnn.com | 1 day |
| FastAB | Unclassified | cnn.com | 12 months |
| geoData | Unclassified | cnn.com | Session |
| gi_ls | Unclassified | cnn.com | 30 days |
| SecGpc | Unclassified | cnn.com | Session |
| st | Unclassified | prd.api.bolt.cnn.com | 30 days |
| stateCode | Unclassified | cnn.com | Session |
| wbdFch | Unclassified | edition.cnn.com | Under a day |
| __cf_bm | Functional | piano.io (third party) | Under a day |
| __cf_bm | Functional | tinypass.com (third party) | Under a day |
| __stripe_mid | Functional | edition.cnn.com | 12 months |
| __stripe_sid | Functional | edition.cnn.com | Under a day |
| __tbc | Functional | cnn.com | 13 months |
| _pcid | Functional | cnn.com | 13 months |
| _pctx | Functional | cnn.com | 13 months |
| countryCode | Functional | cnn.com | Session |
| g_state | Functional | edition.cnn.com | 6 months |
| m | Functional | m.stripe.com (third party) | 13 months |
| OptanonConsent | Functional | cnn.com | 12 months |
| OptanonControl | Functional | cnn.com | 12 months |
| usprivacy | Functional | cnn.com | Session |
| xbc | Functional | cnn.com | 13 months |
The page also wrote 10 keys to local storage, which works like a cookie but isn't sent with requests.
Understanding this page
- How to see which cookies and trackers a website loads
A hands-on walkthrough for checking what a site sets before you've clicked anything, using Chrome and Firefox's built-in tools, plus how CookieTosser automates the same check every month.
- What counts as valid cookie consent in the EU
The rules that actually govern cookie banners — the ePrivacy Directive, the GDPR consent standard, the Planet49 ruling, the strictly-necessary exemption, and what "reject" has to offer compared with "accept.
- Consent management platforms explained
What a CMP banner is actually doing behind the scenes, how the IAB's TCF standard and Google's Consent Mode v2 fit in, and why a banner being present is no guarantee that nothing loads before you answer it.