Effective date: August 9, 2026
This Cookie Policy explains the small files that are stored on your device when you read Learn — our independent, non-government guide to VA health care, treatment, and family support for veterans and families affected by mesothelioma and asbestos exposure. It sits alongside our Privacy Policy, which covers information handling more broadly.
What cookies are
A cookie is a small text file that a website asks your browser to store and send back on later visits. Cookies can remember a preference, keep a page loading quickly, or record that an advertisement has already been shown to you. Related technologies — local storage, pixels, and similar identifiers — do much the same job, and we use “cookies” here to cover all of them.
First-party cookies are set by learn.lyricalguy.com itself. Third-party cookies are set by other companies whose code runs on the page — in our case, principally Google’s advertising systems. We cannot read third-party cookies, and the companies that set them cannot read ours.
Categories of cookies used on this site
Strictly necessary
These keep the site running. WordPress sets session and security cookies when needed, and our LiteSpeed page-caching layer may set a short-lived cookie so returning readers are served the correct cached version of a guide rather than a stale one. These are not used for advertising or profiling, and the site cannot function properly without them.
Advertising
This site is funded by Google AdSense display ads. Google and its partners set cookies to choose which ads to display, to limit how often you see the same ad (frequency capping), to measure ad performance, and to detect invalid clicks and fraud. Because our subject matter is health and benefits related, ad personalization is also constrained by Google’s own policies for sensitive categories.
Analytics
If aggregate readership analytics is enabled, it records which guides are read and how visitors arrive, in aggregate. We use it to decide which topics need better coverage — for example, whether readers are struggling to find our pages on travel reimbursement or caregiver support. We do not use analytics to build profiles of individual readers.
Google advertising cookies and your opt-out choices
- Third-party vendors, including Google, use cookies to serve ads based on a user’s prior visits to this website and other websites.
- Google’s use of advertising cookies — including the DoubleClick/Google ad cookie — enables Google and its partners to serve ads to users based on their visits to this site and/or other sites on the Internet.
- Users may opt out of personalized advertising by visiting Google Ads Settings at https://www.google.com/settings/ads.
- Users may also opt out of a third-party vendor’s use of cookies for personalized advertising by visiting www.aboutads.info/choices.
- Google’s notice “How Google uses information from sites or apps that use our services” is at https://policies.google.com/technologies/partner-sites.
- Google’s general explanation of how it uses cookies is at https://policies.google.com/technologies/cookies.
A broader list of Google certified ad networks and their opt-out tools is available through the Digital Advertising Alliance at aboutads.info. In the EEA and UK, non-essential cookies are set only after consent, and you can change or withdraw that choice at any time.
Controlling and deleting cookies in your browser
Every major browser lets you view, block, and delete cookies. The settings are usually found under privacy or site-data menus:
- Google Chrome: Settings → Privacy and security → Third-party cookies / Delete browsing data.
- Safari (Mac and iPhone): Settings → Safari → Block All Cookies, or Clear History and Website Data.
- Mozilla Firefox: Settings → Privacy & Security → Cookies and Site Data → Manage Data.
- Microsoft Edge: Settings → Cookies and site permissions → Manage and delete cookies.
Most browsers also offer a private or incognito window that discards cookies when you close it, and device-level controls such as “Limit Ad Tracking” on mobile.
What happens if you block cookies
Every guide on this site stays fully readable. Blocking or deleting advertising cookies does not remove ads — it generally means the ads you see are less relevant and are chosen from context rather than from your browsing history. Blocking strictly necessary cookies may cause pages to load more slowly or to display a cached version, but the content remains available. Because cookie opt-outs are themselves usually stored in a cookie, clearing all cookies or switching browsers may reset your choices, and you may need to set them again.
Changes and contact
We will update this page if the cookies used on the site change, and we will revise the effective date above. Questions about cookies, consent, or advertising on Learn can be sent to support@learn.lyricalguy.com. See also our Privacy Policy, Advertising Disclosure, and Contact Us page.