Because in some legal systems you're required to ask. You're also required to follow fairly specific rules relates to the user's selection and data, though I can't imagine enforcement keeps up with websites breaking those laws.

Because EU Cookie Law was a flawed idea?

How so? The law doesn't require cookie banners. However, you could argue that tracking/advertisement cookies should have been banned completely and that the law is flawed in that it allows for tracking given user "consent".

I love the EU apologists - “it wasn’t a bad law just because the outcome was bad”

The alternative being to bend over and grab our ankles with both hands the moment the scummy ad-tech industry requests our data?

Sorry mate, the GDPR is there for a bloody good reason; and legit companies obey the law.

Yes because of the GDPR, there aren’t still two trillion dollar+ market cap ad Tech companies.

But at least we have cookie banners everywhere.

More pity to those who (for some bizarre reason) voluntarily choose to interact with those ad-tech companies.

So you don’t use Google and don’t have an Android phone?

The GDPR is theater. An effective privacy law would have prevented data collection in the first place. Data collected will be abused, and a cute little banner won't change this.

Ummmmm.

The GDPR does outlaw unnecessary collection of personal data without explicit opt-in consent. It's baffling you appear ignorant of this.

Yet, Facebook and Google have a thriving business in the EU among I’m assuming EU companies.

So you can pretend that the law is effective or you can admit that all it gave the world were cookie banners.

The "cookie banners" allow you to opt out of providing your personal data. That is the entire point!

Blame the parasitic ad-tech industry for their existence. Not the lawmakers who protect all our privacy.

The consent is the problem. It should be illegal even with consent, so this whole industry wouldn't exist.

It was not a flawed idea, but flawed execution. The law should have mandated to adhere to the user's "do not track" setting in the browser.

That being said, it was very early regulation in this field, and more recent approaches are already better, e.g., GDPR, DMA.