Cookies should be enforced in the browser. I think all the major browsers block third party cookies now. Bad actors can use other fingerprints to do tracking.
No "cookie banner" is required UNLESS you are using cookies to track me or personally idetify me.... in which case, you must ask my explicit consent to do so.
Blame the parasitic adtech industry wanting trade your personal data. Not the EU for providing you with consumer protection.
Blame them for what? We all understand that personal information is the currency that pays for these services. While we may not love that we have to pay (who does?), we accept it as a fair trade. Until governments get their ass in gear to make paying with more favourable currencies viable, that is going to remain, now just with extra clicks.
> Not the EU for providing you with consumer protection.
I guess a bandaid is better than nothing, but we'd be better off if the EU would tackle the real issue. Going there would ruffle some real feathers, though, so good luck. But if there is blame to go around, it is on the EU for being too afraid to ruffle them.
What are the services? Leave out sites where you pay for something with money, or banks, or subscription sites. Those often have tracking too, but they could exist without it. What services are the free ones providing?
News is a special case, paying for journalism is a problem. Other than that:
* Videos and images
* Forums and blogs
* Databases like IMDB
* Random bits of information you want once in your life
I'm struck by how the presence of any amount of website design makes all these things worse. It's not only too easy for them to get our data, it's too hard for us to get their data, because the presentation and theatrical impression of being a service is all self-aggrandizing and works to delay and capture users for more tracking and ads. All we really want is servers, not services.
If somehow storage and processing was paid for by magical pixies, and available as a utilitarian series of gray bulletin boards with identical design, that would be much better than all the bloated sites that track visitors. It's wrong to portray this as a bargain in which we respect and appreciate some sort of service, and therefore ought to pay for it, because there is no service. They're not being paid for providing something wonderful, they're being paid for having got there first and for being well-known, or promoting themselves.