[pmontra]

Before cookies we used session ids in the query string of the URLs. Maybe you noticed some URL with a JSESSIONID argument in the URL. Same thing.

Those are worse than cookies for a number of reasons but they are functionally equivalent.

Anyway, there is nothing wrong with cookies in general. Privacy-wise the problem are cookies used for tracking. Any other technology would have the same problems and would need an explicit consent from the user, if you are subject to GDPR and similar legislation.