Should European laws allow account deletion?

[CritFromAfar]

It could absolutely be a way to identify a user, especially if they used their actual name, but even then that isn't the only possible way.

As I just said to someone else, if it's not something that can be used to identify them and it isn't used on more than one site, than it can hardly be considered worthy of removing. But even then, people voluntarily put their information out there to begin with. If they choose to do that to begin with, why should it be removed? If they put deeply personal information it might take a simple name change, which MMO-C allows, to make it so that no one can just google your username.

[horbindr]

That's only if the company complies.

there are not that many valid reasons to not comply with a court order, which would be easy to get in both a criminal and civil suit if it was important to the case.

but really since we are mostly talking civil suits, just having screenshots or printouts from before the stuff was deleted would go a long way if the data actually ended up having been deleted.

[munkeyinorbit]

Wow. This is kind of what I'm opposed to, though. I don't believe this kind of information should be allowed to be removed. It may be following laws in one country, but it seems like it could have the potential to step on the toes of other laws in other countries at the same time. Removing information people put out on the internet seems like a bad idea to me.

Like what laws specifically? No head canon here. Real Laws.

[CritFromAfar]

there are not that many valid reasons to not comply with a court order, which would be easy to get in both a criminal and civil suit if it was important to the case.

but really since we are mostly talking civil suits, just having screenshots or printouts from before the stuff was deleted would go a long way if the data actually ended up having been deleted.

You wouldn't be able to get a court order if they had deleted the information before you could save it. Hence why I'm opposed to deletion of information.

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Like what laws specifically? No head canon here. Real Laws.

Different countries have different laws and I'm asking a question not necessarily imposing an opinion. I'm asking about any, I only specified further to give people a bit more direction to know how to respond with.

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Yes of course, but they are not obligated to delete all posts. In fact, they're not even obligated to delete all posts that may contain personal data - there are exceptions.

Yeah, but it still allows them to delete it to begin with. As an example, if person A went ahead and said something harassing to person B and then requested the information be removed, then how is anyone supposed to save it if they didn't do so the first time around? The fact that they're legally allowed to do so is my problem. Police being able to request the information really only applies if they could actually get the information to begin with, and if it's gone, then how does anyone expect them to do that? It's not like people don't make mistakes sometimes. If people can use VPN's to use that, too, despite them not even being from Europe to begin with, then how is that allowed online at all when everyone effected by the opinions of others are not all European to begin with? The already linked site aside, there are flaws even within those laws that are common across most, if not all, sites, and removing information doesn't help people like they might think it does.

[Eosia]

Sounds like an American is angry the rest of the world gets to enjoy #freedom.

Yeah, then the American company goes to the US Supreme Court, gets a ruling there that says they do not have to. Problem solved.

Not to mention the fact that, until the ECoJ ruled against France, that "Right to Be Forgotten" law was attempted to be enforced globally. So someone in Europe could have a say over content on Google.com, Google.co.jp, Google.com.au, etc.

And the thing is we do have freedom... we have the freedom to not give our data out in the first place.

[chaud]

You can get your account deleted. Click the "contact us" button at the top and ask to get your account deleted, and there you go.

This is how account deletions are handled.