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
Because the post I replied to, the actual thing I am addressing, makes an assertion that isn’t entirely true and could lead someone uninformed into believing they can have their information removed platform wide.
Not everyone is concerned with someone digging up dirt or wildly compromising material. Most people aren’t special enough to be worried about that.
Most archives won’t be globally search indexed. An archive won’t show up on a federated search. There is more legitimacy to a federated version over someone reposting a screenshot (at least in perception, how federated could be altered or forged is another topic).
I also mention there are other reasons one might want to remove content. Just look at reddit right now, some may simply want to revoke support for a platform sometime in the future.
Sure, there could be a future where this is addressed. It isn’t right now.
I don’t disagree with you in the larger discussion on persistence of data. I am adding context to a scoped subtopic of it.
You are also kidding yourself if you think that defederation will not become more common. The community we are commenting on has already defederated 2 very large instances.