Why are browser cookies called cookies?

Internet cookies go by the term “cookie” because it originates from the concept of the “magic cookie” in Unix operating systems. It’s a concept that programmers used in early computing to refer to a piece of data that programs passed between each other to identify sessions or processes.

With the rise of the web, Netscape Communications developer Lou Montulli first used the term “cookies” in 1994. He believed that magic cookies could be used in browsers and servers to help websites remember user interactions with sites or apps across sessions.

So, internet cookies are similar to magic cookies – a server passes a small piece of data to the browser that it later returns so that the server can track user behavior across pages.

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