Adobe Experience Platform

Overview

Adobe Experience Platform (AEP) is the foundational data infrastructure layer within Adobe Experience Cloud, responsible for ingesting, processing, and unifying customer data from web and other channels. On websites, it manifests primarily through the Adobe Experience Platform Web SDK (alloy.js), which replaces multiple legacy Adobe libraries (AppMeasurement, DIL, at.js) with a single script. AEP serves as the data backbone that powers other Adobe products like Real-Time CDP, Journey Optimizer, and Customer Journey Analytics.

What This Script Does

The Adobe Experience Platform Web SDK (alloy.js) is the unified client-side library for sending event data to Adobe's Edge Network. It handles data collection, identity management, personalization delivery, and consent management through a single script.

Key cookies set:

• kndctr_[orgID]_AdobeOrg_identity — stores the Experience Cloud ID (ECID) and any additional identity namespaces. Used for persistent visitor identification across sessions and Adobe products. 34-month expiry.
• kndctr_[orgID]_AdobeOrg_consent — records the visitor's consent preferences as communicated through the SDK's consent APIs. 13-month expiry.
• kndctr_[orgID]_AdobeOrg_cluster — identifies which Edge Network cluster is serving the visitor for consistent routing. 30-minute expiry.

The SDK contacts edge.adobedc.net (or a configured first-party CNAME endpoint) to stream events. Each event can include:

• Experience events: page views, link clicks, form interactions, commerce events (product views, add-to-cart, purchases)
• Identity data: login states, hashed emails, CRM IDs, loyalty IDs — used for profile stitching
• Context data: device type, browser, viewport size, connection type, geolocation
• Consent signals: the visitor's consent preferences, which AEP uses to gate downstream data processing

AEP's Edge Network acts as a router: incoming events are evaluated against configured "datastreams" that determine which Adobe services receive the data (Analytics, Audience Manager, Target, Real-Time CDP) and which third-party integrations (via event forwarding) receive copies. This means a single alloy.js deployment can feed data to multiple downstream systems.

The SDK also receives responses from the Edge Network containing personalization decisions (from Target or Journey Optimizer), audience segment qualifications, and other computed results, enabling real-time page modifications.

Consent & Compliance

Adobe Experience Platform spans both analytics and marketing categories. As the data infrastructure layer, it feeds data to both analytics products (Customer Journey Analytics, Adobe Analytics) and marketing products (Real-Time CDP, Journey Optimizer, Audience Manager).

Under the GDPR, AEP processes significant volumes of personal data — persistent visitor IDs, behavioral event streams, and potentially directly identifiable information when identity data is configured. The 34-month ECID cookie duration is notable. The Edge Network's role as a data router means consent decisions must account for all downstream services that receive the data, not just AEP itself.

The ePrivacy Directive requires consent for the identity cookies set by the Web SDK. The kndctr_*_identity cookie (34-month expiry) is used for cross-session visitor identification and is not strictly necessary for website functionality.

Under CCPA/CPRA, the breadth of data collected through AEP and its distribution to advertising and personalization services may constitute "sharing" of personal information. The event forwarding capability, which can send data to third-party platforms, expands the compliance surface significantly.

AEP does provide built-in consent management capabilities through its Consent extension, which can gate data collection based on the visitor's consent status. However, the consent mechanism itself requires the SDK to load, creating a bootstrapping consideration for strict pre-consent blocking approaches.

Should You Block This Without Consent?

Yes. Adobe Experience Platform's Web SDK collects behavioral data and distributes it to analytics and marketing services. Its persistent identification cookies and cross-product data routing make it non-essential for basic website functionality. It should be blocked until consent is obtained, with the consent state communicated through the SDK once loaded.