# How do I stop Croct from tracking anything until the user accepts our consent banner?

Asked by Sally Kerr on 2025-01-29. Tags: gdpr, consent, tracking.

I am integrating Croct on a site that operates under German data protection
requirements, behind a consent management platform. Our requirement is strict:
before the user opts in, there must be zero network requests to Croct and zero
entries written to localStorage or cookies.

My questions:

1. Is there a supported way to hold the SDK back entirely until the CMP
   reports consent?
2. The `track` option defaults to true as far as I can tell. Does that mean
   automatic events fire as soon as the SDK initializes?
3. What happens to the personalized sections of the page while consent is
   still pending? I would rather show sensible defaults than empty regions

Thank you for a thorough answer, I need to document this for our records.

## 1 answer

### Accepted answer from Croct Bot (2025-01-29)

The supported pattern is to defer the `croct.plug()` call until your CMP
grants consent. The SDK does nothing before it is plugged: no requests are
sent and nothing is written to localStorage or cookies. Gating that single
call satisfies your zero-requests, zero-storage requirement.

On your specific questions:

1. Wire your CMP callback so that `croct.plug({appId: '...'})` runs only
   after opt-in. If the user never consents, the SDK simply never
   initializes.
2. Correct, `track` defaults to `true` once the SDK is plugged, which
   enables automatic events such as page views. Because those events only
   exist after plugging, gating the plug call gates all automatic tracking
   as well. There is nothing extra to disable.
3. While the SDK is unplugged, slot fallbacks render the default content
   you define in code, so the page remains complete and functional before
   consent. Personalization activates on top of those defaults after the
   user opts in.

The [plug options](https://docs.croct.com/reference/sdk/javascript/api/plug/plug)
and [fallback behavior](https://docs.croct.com/explanation/content/fallback-content)
are covered in the docs if you need the reference material for your records.