Definition

Intelligent Tracking Prevention (ITP)

Apple Safari’s privacy feature that limits cookie lifespan and blocks cross-site tracking. ITP reduces first-party cookie life to 7 days (or 24 hours when set via JavaScript with tracking query parameters) and blocks all third-party cookies.

Impact on analytics

Safari holds approximately 20% of European browser market share (higher on mobile). ITP means that any visitor who returns after 7 days appears as a “new” visitor in cookie-based analytics — inflating new user counts and fragmenting user journeys.

For analytics that rely on cookies for session stitching and attribution, ITP makes accurate multi-visit tracking effectively impossible on Safari. Combined with Firefox’s Enhanced Tracking Protection (ETP), more than 35% of browser traffic is subject to aggressive cookie restrictions.

Why first-party measurement is unaffected

Cookieless analytics does not store cookies on the visitor’s device, so ITP and ETP have no effect on data collection. The first-party cookieless approach keeps capturing sessions when ITP and ETP restrict cookies.

Related concepts

Learn more: Cookieless Analytics Explained · How Sealmetrics Works

Quick answer

Intelligent Tracking Prevention (ITP) is Apple Safari’s machine-learning-driven privacy system that caps first-party analytics cookies at 7 days, drops third-party cookies entirely, and shortens cookie lifespan to 24 hours when the cookie is set via JavaScript on a page that arrived with a tracking query parameter. Firefox ships an equivalent feature called Enhanced Tracking Protection (ETP).

For analytics that depend on cookies to recognise returning visitors or stitch multi-day attribution, ITP makes accurate measurement effectively impossible on the 20%+ of EU traffic that uses Safari. Cookieless first-party server-side collection sets no cookie, so ITP and ETP have no effect — visits are counted on the same aggregate basis regardless of browser, regardless of how many days have passed.