Federated services have always had privacy issues but I expected Lemmy would have the fewest, but it’s visibly worse for privacy than even Reddit.
- Deleted comments remain on the server but hidden to non-admins, the username remains visible
- Deleted account usernames remain visible too
- Anything remains visible on federated servers!
- When you delete your account, media does not get deleted on any server
In both services you are basically shouting into a giant megaphone. What’s so private about it? If you don’t want say it in public, don’t say it there.
If you need privacy there are much better tools available such as pgp encrypted email or Matrix DMs (a nonfederated Matrix sever would be even more secure but rather overkill).