Scrubbing previous posts off a platform - does it do anything from a privacy perspective? - Or is it a feel good thing?

[ToxicKek]

Serious discussion. I've noticed people occasionally deleting their past posts from platforms like Reddit, Twitter, Facebook and other forums. I think the most prolific example of today is Michael Burry who makes a post before deleting it, sometimes literally seconds later, for some strange reason. What's the point of even posting?

I was told that, at least on Facebook, the delete button sometimes marks something as "hidden from public" and doesn't actually delete it. Not sure about posts on Reddit and other places that run on XenForo, VB, PHPBB, etc. Does deleting do anything or is it all security theater?

In a scenario where one wants to get off the platform completely, isn't scrubbing posts using text overwrite better for privacy vs deleting?

 

[Spud]

No because I archive every post ever made to facebook, twitter, reddit and other normie social media apps for blackmail purposes

 

[AmpleApricots]

As you heard, they probably don't delete anything. It's already alone if you detail your plans to blow up the world in minecraft and then get sober next morning and delete that post, trust me the cops/FBI/secret service that are going to show up will still have it printed out right there when they interview you. It'd be too simple otherwise. The platforms are not responsible for what you do and they'd be stupid to try to protect you or your privacy, because there'd be legislation.

Your best bet is probably overwriting them with nonsense via editing function and hope the guy making the backend had a rotten day because he forgot to fill up his hormone prescription and didn't code anything to store an edit history.

Ultimately though, these services still back up and your embarrassing facebook post from 2009 will still sit in a vault when you're in your 60s and possibly be used to train AI and such.

Social Media: Not even once, kids.

 

[Coffee Shits]

With a lot of things in security, it depends on your threat model. Who are you defending yourself against?

Normalfags - yes, deleting posts is effective. Long-term retention (archival, search engine caches, local download, screenshots/screen recording etc) is a foreign concept to most. In my experience opening up a laptop or unlocking a phone is like driving in the rain: there is an immediate 30 IQ dropoff as a result. 90% of people fall into this category and rely on the other 10% to get their information on the Internet. Depending on who you're talking about, journalists may also fall into this category.

Kiwi Farmers - deleting posts is possibly effective. "ARCHIVE EVERYTHING" is a common refrain and some will do so proactively. Once it's bubbled up through this channel and made its way out to the 90%, it doesn't matter if the original post was deleted or not. This of course depends on how interesting the deleter or his content is: if a cow has DFE'd faster than a farmer can archive, then it's likely lost to the public internet, barring more specialized cases.

The site itself/its jannies - deleting posts is probably not effective. It's become common practice for companies that can afford to maintain mega-sized databases to never truly destroy data, only to flag it as "deleted", with the data itself intact and no longer presented to anyone but the jannies, who can read it or restore it at any time. Even revising the post by way of blanking it does not prevent this - with modern technology all revisions are stored and restoring any of them is trivial.

Here at KF there have been multiple instances where a janny will provide a public service and restore a cow's post because it was funny. While unlikely, this measure could be taken by large sites like Facebook or Twitter where the data could be retrieved by said jannies at the behest of law enforcement, or perhaps for personal vendetta purposes. In the latter case the data could perhaps be laundered through a friendly journalist, or just leaked anonymously, again if the data or the deleter is of interest. Regardless, the "deleted" data is still there.

The State - deleting posts is not effective. Everything you post is hoovered up and stored for what amounts to forever, be it through a backdoor like the PRISM program or snooping directly on the wire. If it is encrypted, you can bet it will be decrypted eventually. This is why it's important to obfuscate the source of the information through technology like I2P or Tor and to not overshare. This is ostensibly protected by the Fourth Amendment, where hoovering this data is illegal and thus cannot be used in a court of law, but parallel construction is always an option for the motivated government agent.

 

[Shig O'nella]

Mostly it just gets people's attention. The odd delete of an old post isn't really remarkable, but regularly doing so will catch the attention of some autist with an archive script.
If' you're going to delete old stuff from public view, either do it all at once and leave the platform for good a day or so later, or do it slowly over time if you're planning on keeping the account for any reason. Maybe one delete today, one next week, one three days in a row a month after that.

Edit: See post above. Much better than this one.

 

[Justice4BlaineGreenwich]

If' you're going to delete old stuff from public view, either do it all at once and leave the platform for good a day or so later, or do it slowly over time if you're planning on keeping the account for any reason. Maybe one delete today, one next week, one three days in a row a month after that.

Just make your accounts private.

 

[Boss Nigger]

I have been doing a lot of hunting after Jed Clayton trying to find some of his stuff 10 years ago is a nightmare. because yes Everything is always archived. but how accessible are those archives. sure I could check way back machine, but there's ways to get that deleted. same with archive.is

autistic schreeching

this is the best most consistent reply youre going to get on this topic.

 

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@ToxicKek posting things then deleting them when you are an object of attention is for fags.

People who have become objects of attention (lolcows in utero) should immediately delete everything, cut all ties to previous internet presence, and start again (if they absolutely must have an online presence). There is no such thing as a bot that looks for people who are in the process of running Tweetdelete and archives the rest of their tweets.

Obviously, if you're a political target that's an entirely different kettle of fish. If you've fedposted from your residential IP on 4chan, you're probably on a list, and it would likely interfere with any effective violent direct action you might be considering. Time to consider peaceful political action.