Unless someone feels like breaking into a datacenter (and likely several cold backup facilities) and mechanically wiping data, that shit is there forever. Facebook deletes nothing.
“Never Delete Anything” is Standard at every place I’ve worked. What happens is that anything that is requested to be deleted is simply marked as “Deleted” in the database.
Not to discredit or counterpoint what you’re saying… But in some jurisdictions, that’s illegal. As an example, California RTA/RTF laws make it a requirement that some data should be deleted unless there’s a different legal standard requiring the data be kept. Enforcement? Who knows?
To add, not deleted stuff is what my favorite lawyers call “discoverable”. Not sure how many lawyers Meta has but I’m betting at least one of them is reminding them deleting stuff is a good thing.
Even Reddit doesn’t delete your post(data) when you delete your account. You will have to do it. Yourself first, of you have hundreds of posts or comments
Think about it in terms of risk / reward or if you like, shareholder value.
If the value of the data exceeds the fine combined with the risk of it being discovered, the data will continue to exist.
Factor in the cost of actually guaranteeing that deleting something across all online, nearline, offline and archived data stores and the chances of anything being purposely deleted are not high.
Accidental data loss, sure, purposeful data loss, I can’t see it happening.
GDPR fines can reach up to $20 million dollars. That’s not a business expense. That’s quiet a dent in their quarterly balance sheet. And the EU has issued hefty fines in the past. This is not the USA we’re talking about.
In the last quarter of 2024 it shows a net income of $20,838 million. A $20 million fine would change that 3 into a 1 and again, that’s net income for just for three months.
Interesting, when you read that article, it says that Meta will appeal, searching for the GDPR fine and the appeal, all I found was more fines, but no records of the results of any appeals.
The fines for not complying with GDPR are company killing in size, even for a company as big as Meta. The value of an individuals data definitely does not exceed 4% of total annual yearly revenue, which can be the size of the fine for a single violation.
On 2024s global annual revenue of meta that would be a fine of $6.5billion. That’s 10% of their profits for the year.
I guarantee you they are complying with the GDPRs “right to be forgotten” rules.
I think you vastly underestimate just how much Meta is a law unto itself.
This is a company that has threatened countries … twice … Australia and Canada.
It’s not limited to Meta or silicon valley companies either, the fossil fuel companies and pharmaceutical companies are doing the same.
Once a company gets to a certain size, it appears that they become immune to the law and act accordingly, silencing dissent and fighting every obstacle with dogged persistence.
So, the law might say that data should be deleted, but I’d not bet my life on it.
I’m going with … never.
Yup, them “shadow profiles” will become sentient one day
Fuck! Thanks. Anyway my…ummm…friend can have his meta footprint deleted?
Unless someone feels like breaking into a datacenter (and likely several cold backup facilities) and mechanically wiping data, that shit is there forever. Facebook deletes nothing.
“Never Delete Anything” is Standard at every place I’ve worked. What happens is that anything that is requested to be deleted is simply marked as “Deleted” in the database.
Not to discredit or counterpoint what you’re saying… But in some jurisdictions, that’s illegal. As an example, California RTA/RTF laws make it a requirement that some data should be deleted unless there’s a different legal standard requiring the data be kept. Enforcement? Who knows?
To add, not deleted stuff is what my favorite lawyers call “discoverable”. Not sure how many lawyers Meta has but I’m betting at least one of them is reminding them deleting stuff is a good thing.
Even Reddit doesn’t delete your post(data) when you delete your account. You will have to do it. Yourself first, of you have hundreds of posts or comments
deleted by creator
Reddit has a change log of your comments. This does nothing to their underlying data
it doesnt, but rather have all the comments deleted in any case.
You mean thermite the drives while the employees are gone for a holiday/lunch?
If your friend is an EU citizen, they might have some luck with a GDPR request to delete all their data.
They also might not. Meta technically would have to comply, but there is no real way to know if they did.
Same response as the EU but for California.
Don’t they ressurect dead accounts, and use the ai to post randomly
That’s illegal in Europe.
And?
And what? The EU has a trackrecord of pretty hefty fines. They won’t risk it for this many users.
Think about it in terms of risk / reward or if you like, shareholder value.
If the value of the data exceeds the fine combined with the risk of it being discovered, the data will continue to exist.
Factor in the cost of actually guaranteeing that deleting something across all online, nearline, offline and archived data stores and the chances of anything being purposely deleted are not high.
Accidental data loss, sure, purposeful data loss, I can’t see it happening.
GDPR fines can reach up to $20 million dollars. That’s not a business expense. That’s quiet a dent in their quarterly balance sheet. And the EU has issued hefty fines in the past. This is not the USA we’re talking about.
Again, you vastly underestimate the size of Meta.
In the last quarter of 2024 it shows a net income of $20,838 million. A $20 million fine would change that 3 into a 1 and again, that’s net income for just for three months.
Source: https://investor.atmeta.com/investor-news/press-release-details/2025/Meta-Reports-Fourth-Quarter-and-Full-Year-2024-Results/default.aspx
How about a $1.2 Billion fine ? Would that perhaps be consequential ?
They got hit with that 2 years ago
https://dataprivacymanager.net/5-biggest-gdpr-fines-so-far-2020/
Interesting, when you read that article, it says that Meta will appeal, searching for the GDPR fine and the appeal, all I found was more fines, but no records of the results of any appeals.
Also, it was €1.2 Billion, not $1.2 Billion.
Actually GDPR fines can reach 3% of revenue if i recall my compulsory training correctly. That’s a lot more than $20m for farcebook I would expect
It’s up to $20 million or 3%.
I just checked, it’s 4% of revenue and apparently Meta has already had a €1.2 Billion fine yes that B is not a typo.
https://dataprivacymanager.net/5-biggest-gdpr-fines-so-far-2020/
The fines for not complying with GDPR are company killing in size, even for a company as big as Meta. The value of an individuals data definitely does not exceed 4% of total annual yearly revenue, which can be the size of the fine for a single violation.
On 2024s global annual revenue of meta that would be a fine of $6.5billion. That’s 10% of their profits for the year.
I guarantee you they are complying with the GDPRs “right to be forgotten” rules.
I understand your point.
I think you vastly underestimate just how much Meta is a law unto itself.
This is a company that has threatened countries … twice … Australia and Canada.
It’s not limited to Meta or silicon valley companies either, the fossil fuel companies and pharmaceutical companies are doing the same.
Once a company gets to a certain size, it appears that they become immune to the law and act accordingly, silencing dissent and fighting every obstacle with dogged persistence.
So, the law might say that data should be deleted, but I’d not bet my life on it.
I know people that work there, quite high up, and can tell you that they do comply with these requests.
It’s legal if they irreversibly anonymise it.
So the content you created will still be used to train AI with no consent from or payment to you.