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Post by fionn on Aug 2, 2020 7:05:40 GMT -8
Recently, ProBoards was updated so Deleted User's forums usernames' wouldn't retain on their profile, and instead it would say "Deleted"... What I suggest is instead of 'Deleted', you make it their Forums User ID. This will make it easier to identify Deleted Users and make it easier to know who's who.
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Feb 19, 2024 11:58:20 GMT -8
VanWoman84
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ukhippies
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Post by VanWoman84 on Aug 2, 2020 8:05:36 GMT -8
I agree this is a good idea, but PB thinks otherwise unfortunately.
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Dec 23, 2020 14:41:29 GMT -8
Alex R Jamison
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January 2014
alexr
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Post by Alex R Jamison on Aug 2, 2020 13:05:21 GMT -8
Recently, ProBoards was updated so Deleted User's forums usernames' wouldn't retain on their profile, and instead it would say "Deleted"... What I suggest is instead of 'Deleted', you make it their Forums User ID. This will make it easier to identify Deleted Users and make it easier to know who's who. The point is to NOT be able to differentiate them and NOT know who is who. We gotta respect the LAW.
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Kami
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Post by Kami on Aug 2, 2020 13:52:27 GMT -8
Recently, ProBoards was updated so Deleted User's forums usernames' wouldn't retain on their profile, and instead it would say "Deleted"... What I suggest is instead of 'Deleted', you make it their Forums User ID. This will make it easier to identify Deleted Users and make it easier to know who's who. I agree this is a good idea, but PB thinks otherwise unfortunately. Recently, ProBoards was updated so Deleted User's forums usernames' wouldn't retain on their profile, and instead it would say "Deleted"... What I suggest is instead of 'Deleted', you make it their Forums User ID. This will make it easier to identify Deleted Users and make it easier to know who's who. The point is to NOT be able to differentiate them and NOT know who is who. We gotta respect the LAW. To provide a little more context into what Alex has stated: There have been several changes to privacy laws and what is considered personally identifiable user information. In particular, GDPR requires all providers to return or delete ALL user data, without exception, when a user terminates their account on the service. While a numerical user ID is not inherently "identifiable" as such (for example, ID 123 on this forum will not necessarily be the same user as ID 123 on another forum), allowing a method of collecting all content on a specific forum associated with that ID does lead to that ID becoming "personally identifiable". Without this ID, there is no way to discern whether or not the "deleted user" posts belong to multiple people or the same person or which posts are which. This is the best way for PB to ensure that they comply with GDPR without compromising the integrity of the forum chronology. The other option is to also delete all content associated with a deleted user's ID, which is probably not ideal for most forums.
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Nov 3, 2020 3:25:46 GMT -8
fionn
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July 2016
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Post by fionn on Aug 2, 2020 14:44:09 GMT -8
Recently, ProBoards was updated so Deleted User's forums usernames' wouldn't retain on their profile, and instead it would say "Deleted"... What I suggest is instead of 'Deleted', you make it their Forums User ID. This will make it easier to identify Deleted Users and make it easier to know who's who. I agree this is a good idea, but PB thinks otherwise unfortunately. The point is to NOT be able to differentiate them and NOT know who is who. We gotta respect the LAW. To provide a little more context into what Alex has stated: There have been several changes to privacy laws and what is considered personally identifiable user information. In particular, GDPR requires all providers to return or delete ALL user data, without exception, when a user terminates their account on the service. While a numerical user ID is not inherently "identifiable" as such (for example, ID 123 on this forum will not necessarily be the same user as ID 123 on another forum), allowing a method of collecting all content on a specific forum associated with that ID does lead to that ID becoming "personally identifiable". Without this ID, there is no way to discern whether or not the "deleted user" posts belong to multiple people or the same person or which posts are which. This is the best way for PB to ensure that they comply with GDPR without compromising the integrity of the forum chronology. The other option is to also delete all content associated with a deleted user's ID, which is probably not ideal for most forums. Problem is, quotes include usernames... Deleted or not. It's either you fully abide by it or you don't at all...
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Kami
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Post by Kami on Aug 2, 2020 15:27:58 GMT -8
To provide a little more context into what Alex has stated: There have been several changes to privacy laws and what is considered personally identifiable user information. In particular, GDPR requires all providers to return or delete ALL user data, without exception, when a user terminates their account on the service. While a numerical user ID is not inherently "identifiable" as such (for example, ID 123 on this forum will not necessarily be the same user as ID 123 on another forum), allowing a method of collecting all content on a specific forum associated with that ID does lead to that ID becoming "personally identifiable". Without this ID, there is no way to discern whether or not the "deleted user" posts belong to multiple people or the same person or which posts are which. This is the best way for PB to ensure that they comply with GDPR without compromising the integrity of the forum chronology. The other option is to also delete all content associated with a deleted user's ID, which is probably not ideal for most forums. Problem is, quotes include usernames... Deleted or not. It's either you fully abide by it or you don't at all... I don't disagree with this, and it's probably an oversight from PB or simply something that hasn't been completed yet because of the way quotes are structured -- quotes pull plaintext usernames that are converted into a link by the software using the @ function. @ tags aren't retroactively deleted -- if you quote a deleted user after they're deleted, the @ tag tried to tag @ Deleted instead of the username. I'm not sure if there's a good way to fix this, since the username isn't inherently tied to a user ID (the same username can be used by two different IDs provided it's not simultaneous) so a quoted post that references a deleted username is not immediately identifiable with a particular account from a logistics perspective. If User 123 has the username of bob and is deleted, how can you change bob in a quote to change to Deleted if it's not attached to User 123? (Rhetorical food for thought). It's a lot more complex to try to change a quoted deleted username with the current way quotes are structured to tag a user by username instead of going off of user ID, than it is to make sure mini profiles do not contain a username or ID. That doesn't mean such changes aren't incoming, though, so its possible that this will be addressed in the future as well. Does that make sense?
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Former Member
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guest@proboards.com
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January 1970
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Post by Former Member on Aug 5, 2020 11:22:09 GMT -8
Without this ID, there is no way to discern whether or not the "deleted user" posts belong to multiple people or the same person or which posts are which. You say that like it’s a good thing. Perhaps there could be a compromise in which PB stops deleting banned accounts by request. I don’t understand the reason anyway. Most people use pseudonyms. It’s impossible to “personally identify” anonymity.
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Scott
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socalso
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Post by Scott on Aug 5, 2020 11:31:58 GMT -8
jcarter, current laws state that a user has a right to have their account deleted. If the user is unable to delete their account due to it being banned or disabled, then by request we must delete their account for them.
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Post by Former Member on Aug 5, 2020 11:41:58 GMT -8
jcarter, current laws state that a user has a right to have their account deleted. If the user is unable to delete their account due to it being banned or disabled, then by request we must delete their account for them. The problem isn’t the deletion of the account; it’s the deletion of its name. The post history is still there, but damn near impossible to reference when needed. Ditto for security logs.
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Kami
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Post by Kami on Aug 5, 2020 11:48:34 GMT -8
Without this ID, there is no way to discern whether or not the "deleted user" posts belong to multiple people or the same person or which posts are which. You say that like it’s a good thing. Perhaps there could be a compromise in which PB stops deleting banned accounts by request. I don’t understand the reason anyway. Most people use pseudonyms. It’s impossible to “personally identify” anonymity. For clarity, you're reading too much into what I said. It was a statement of fact -- there's no ID to discern one deleted user from another so it doesn't immediately identify if a post belongs to person A or person B, or if they're all the same person. This is a factual statement based on forum functionality and nothing else. And, to Scott's point, it's is legally required both in the US and under EU's GDPR. "Personal identity" is not limited to just statistical information, so removing said statistical information (username / email address / etc) makes the non-statistical information (eg: personal anecdotes) more nebulous. The other option is just removing ALL content from a user when they go including all posts. I don't think anyone wants that to happen because it would kill forums' chronology, so this is a good middle-ground option that satisfies both the letter and spirit of the law, even if it's inconvenient to admins. RE: Post history and security logs - you still have IP and you still have general context. It's not easy but there's simply a prioritisation over personal data instead of admin convenience. No one is saying you have to like it or that it's useful from an admin's perspective. TBH i'm not a huge fan, from an admin perspective. But the safety and privacy of my users is more important than things being easy for me, in this case.
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Former Member
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guest@proboards.com
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Apr 24, 2024 15:16:18 GMT -8
Former Member
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January 1970
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Post by Former Member on Aug 5, 2020 12:45:17 GMT -8
You say that like it’s a good thing. Perhaps there could be a compromise in which PB stops deleting banned accounts by request. I don’t understand the reason anyway. Most people use pseudonyms. It’s impossible to “personally identify” anonymity. For clarity, you're reading too much into what I said. It was a statement of fact -- there's no ID to discern one deleted user from another so it doesn't immediately identify if a post belongs to person A or person B, or if they're all the same person. This is a factual statement based on forum functionality and nothing else. And, to Scott's point, it's is legally required both in the US and under EU's GDPR. "Personal identity" is not limited to just statistical information, so removing said statistical information (username / email address / etc) makes the non-statistical information (eg: personal anecdotes) more nebulous. The other option is just removing ALL content from a user when they go including all posts. I don't think anyone wants that to happen because it would kill forums' chronology, so this is a good middle-ground option that satisfies both the letter and spirit of the law, even if it's inconvenient to admins. RE: Post history and security logs - you still have IP and you still have general context. It's not easy but there's simply a prioritisation over personal data instead of admin convenience. No one is saying you have to like it or that it's useful from an admin's perspective. TBH i'm not a huge fan, from an admin perspective. But the safety and privacy of my users is more important than things being easy for me, in this case. Apparently I wasn't reading enough into what you said. How about just assigning randomly-generated usernames to deleted accounts? Or just use the account number that's assigned sequentially upon registration? Anything that distinguishes one deleted account from another would be most helpful, especially considering that many people use a plethora of different IP addresses.
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Kami
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Kami
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Post by Kami on Aug 5, 2020 13:05:19 GMT -8
For clarity, you're reading too much into what I said. It was a statement of fact -- there's no ID to discern one deleted user from another so it doesn't immediately identify if a post belongs to person A or person B, or if they're all the same person. This is a factual statement based on forum functionality and nothing else. And, to Scott's point, it's is legally required both in the US and under EU's GDPR. "Personal identity" is not limited to just statistical information, so removing said statistical information (username / email address / etc) makes the non-statistical information (eg: personal anecdotes) more nebulous. The other option is just removing ALL content from a user when they go including all posts. I don't think anyone wants that to happen because it would kill forums' chronology, so this is a good middle-ground option that satisfies both the letter and spirit of the law, even if it's inconvenient to admins. RE: Post history and security logs - you still have IP and you still have general context. It's not easy but there's simply a prioritisation over personal data instead of admin convenience. No one is saying you have to like it or that it's useful from an admin's perspective. TBH i'm not a huge fan, from an admin perspective. But the safety and privacy of my users is more important than things being easy for me, in this case. Apparently I wasn't reading enough into what you said. How about just assigning randomly-generated usernames to deleted accounts? Or just use the account number that's assigned sequentially upon registration? Anything that distinguishes one deleted account from another would be most helpful, especially considering that many people use a plethora of different IP addresses. :P fair enough From a logistics perspective, a randomly generated username would probably be a no-go. By de-identifying a deleted account, you can no longer discern if post A is by person A or person B. By assigning any unique designation to a deleted account, you allow for the aggregation of personal information of a specific user. While this may not be against the letter of the law (I'm not sure, since I'm not a lawyer) it is for sure against the spirit of the law because the intent is to prevent anyone from leaving behind any content that can lead back to them for privacy reasons. Now, there are limitations to how reasonable this is. We've touched on one, which is that it kills a forum to have posts removed from the context of a conversation every time a user is deleted. Similarly, expecting a user to never give out anything that could remotely be traced to them is just impractical and impossible to enforce. While a unique, randomised ID won't specifically say that User12345 is the same as the user previously known as JohnSmith, having the ability to pull those posts together could reveal that connection. From an admin side, this really sucks because you have to weigh the two needs. Admins desire to have the ability to tell who posted what. But deleted users have the desire (and legal requirement) to make sure that personal data is removed . If we don't want the catchall of "personal data" -- which is really a very broad phrase, it can be things like phone numbers, etc AND it can also be geolocation and behavioural data (like sites visited, actions taken on those sites like... posts...) -- to include literally everything anyone does on a forum, we have to compromise by de-identifying the creator.
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Former Member
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guest@proboards.com
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Apr 24, 2024 15:16:18 GMT -8
Former Member
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January 1970
Former Member
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Post by Former Member on Aug 5, 2020 13:35:22 GMT -8
Apparently I wasn't reading enough into what you said. How about just assigning randomly-generated usernames to deleted accounts? Or just use the account number that's assigned sequentially upon registration? Anything that distinguishes one deleted account from another would be most helpful, especially considering that many people use a plethora of different IP addresses. fair enough From a logistics perspective, a randomly generated username would probably be a no-go. By de-identifying a deleted account, you can no longer discern if post A is by person A or person B. By assigning any unique designation to a deleted account, you allow for the aggregation of personal information of a specific user. While this may not be against the letter of the law (I'm not sure, since I'm not a lawyer) it is for sure against the spirit of the law because the intent is to prevent anyone from leaving behind any content that can lead back to them for privacy reasons. Now, there are limitations to how reasonable this is. We've touched on one, which is that it kills a forum to have posts removed from the context of a conversation every time a user is deleted. Similarly, expecting a user to never give out anything that could remotely be traced to them is just impractical and impossible to enforce. While a unique, randomised ID won't specifically say that User12345 is the same as the user previously known as JohnSmith, having the ability to pull those posts together could reveal that connection. From an admin side, this really sucks because you have to weigh the two needs. Admins desire to have the ability to tell who posted what. But deleted users have the desire (and legal requirement) to make sure that personal data is removed . If we don't want the catchall of "personal data" -- which is really a very broad phrase, it can be things like phone numbers, etc AND it can also be geolocation and behavioural data (like sites visited, actions taken on those sites like... posts...) -- to include literally everything anyone does on a forum, we have to compromise by de-identifying the creator. I suppose all of that makes sense in a certain light; it's just that "de-identifying" porn spammers and their ilk makes it even more difficult to ensure ToS compliance. While I would never condone the illicit exposure of anyone's true identity, forum Admins still need to be able to identify their accounts.
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Kami
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Post by Kami on Aug 5, 2020 13:44:33 GMT -8
fair enough From a logistics perspective, a randomly generated username would probably be a no-go. By de-identifying a deleted account, you can no longer discern if post A is by person A or person B. By assigning any unique designation to a deleted account, you allow for the aggregation of personal information of a specific user. While this may not be against the letter of the law (I'm not sure, since I'm not a lawyer) it is for sure against the spirit of the law because the intent is to prevent anyone from leaving behind any content that can lead back to them for privacy reasons. Now, there are limitations to how reasonable this is. We've touched on one, which is that it kills a forum to have posts removed from the context of a conversation every time a user is deleted. Similarly, expecting a user to never give out anything that could remotely be traced to them is just impractical and impossible to enforce. While a unique, randomised ID won't specifically say that User12345 is the same as the user previously known as JohnSmith, having the ability to pull those posts together could reveal that connection. From an admin side, this really sucks because you have to weigh the two needs. Admins desire to have the ability to tell who posted what. But deleted users have the desire (and legal requirement) to make sure that personal data is removed . If we don't want the catchall of "personal data" -- which is really a very broad phrase, it can be things like phone numbers, etc AND it can also be geolocation and behavioural data (like sites visited, actions taken on those sites like... posts...) -- to include literally everything anyone does on a forum, we have to compromise by de-identifying the creator. I suppose all of that makes sense in a certain light; it's just that "de-identifying" porn spammers and their ilk makes it even more difficult to ensure ToS compliance. While I would never condone the illicit exposure of anyone's true identity, forum Admins still need to be able to identify their accounts. Respectfully I would disagree with this perspective on spammers and the like. It's doubtful that retaining any of that information is actually particularly helpful. You still have access to the IP address, and assuming you banned the account prior to deleting it the email should still be on the ban list in the event you need to cross reference to see if a spammer has returned or if it's a new instance. The percentage of spammers to legitimate users is overall very small, so the convenience of this is not superseding the need from users. The only benefit here is really trying to cross reference the data, but in practicality all you need to do is ban & delete. If you are aggregating this data separately, that's a violation of the TOS, which I am very sure you are not doing, of course. ;x
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Former Member
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guest@proboards.com
242523
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Apr 24, 2024 15:16:18 GMT -8
Former Member
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January 1970
Former Member
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Post by Former Member on Aug 5, 2020 14:19:46 GMT -8
I suppose all of that makes sense in a certain light; it's just that "de-identifying" porn spammers and their ilk makes it even more difficult to ensure ToS compliance. While I would never condone the illicit exposure of anyone's true identity, forum Admins still need to be able to identify their accounts. Respectfully I would disagree with this perspective on spammers and the like. It's doubtful that retaining any of that information is actually particularly helpful. You still have access to the IP address, and assuming you banned the account prior to deleting it the email should still be on the ban list in the event you need to cross reference to see if a spammer has returned or if it's a new instance. The percentage of spammers to legitimate users is overall very small, so the convenience of this is not superseding the need from users. The only benefit here is really trying to cross reference the data, but in practicality all you need to do is ban & delete. If you are aggregating this data separately, that's a violation of the TOS, which I am very sure you are not doing, of course. ;x If "Joe" has more than one account on my forum and posts porn with one of them, I will ban Joe, not just that one account of his. Furthermore, I will reject any subsequent registrations from him. There is a reason no two accounts on the same forum can have the same username. It would be helpful to be able to differentiate one "Deleted" from another without even more cross-referencing. A randomly generated username would not identify an already un-identified user. To be clear, when I say randomly generated username, I'm not talking about drawing a legit name out of the hat. I'm talking more like a randomly generated password. You know, like F6s09mG@;h&!f. It would also help the members, not just the admins.
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