Building GDPR-Proof Websites in the Netherlands

In the Netherlands, websites fall under the GDPR (AVG) and the Telecommunications Act. The regulator, the Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens, actively checks sites and can issue substantial fines. For any business operating here, compliance is not a nice-to-have.

The most common violation is analytics that set cookies before the visitor consents. Standard Google Analytics shares data with Google and therefore needs prior consent — which means a proper banner with a "reject all" option as prominent as "accept all". Many sites get this wrong.

There is a cleaner path. Privacy-first, cookieless analytics (like the setup we use) measure visits without personal identifiers and without cookies. No banner is legally required because nothing that needs consent is stored. The site is simpler, faster, and compliant by design.

Beyond analytics, a compliant site means: a clear privacy policy that matches the tools you actually use, a cookie policy that lists exactly what is stored, forms that only collect what they need and explain why, and secure transmission (HTTPS everywhere). Each of these is straightforward when built in from the start and painful to retrofit.

There is a commercial upside too. Dutch customers value transparency. "AVG-proof and accessible" is a genuine selling point, not just a legal box to tick — it signals that you take your visitors' data as seriously as your own.

We build privacy in from the first line of code: cookieless measurement, honest policies and minimal data collection. It is the right thing to do, and it happens to make for a better website.