But I'm surprised people think entity like Facebook, Google and any other web businesses delete records permanently. It's not worth it on so many level:
- People that actually want to retrieve their stuff,
- It's harder to implement a full delete than it is to add a flag,
- They would have to give up on data-mining assets.
Flagging items as deleted as opposed to actually deleting them is one thing. Of course it's not ideal for someone who wants to revoke facbook's access to their data, but there is more or less no difference from a user perspective. If I understand correctly, what's going on here is that after the posts and other content were flagged as deleted, they were somehow unflagged and became fully visible again. That's different, and really not okay at all.
Except that a bug implies it was accidental. Everyone deserves the benefit of doubt, but Facebook's history is exceptional in this regard.
Similar to the OP, I have ethical concerns with some aspects of what Facebook does, or at least obvious harmful side effects of what they do. But I think for me the reason they bother me more than Google or others often lumped into the same category is the consistent and, as far as I can tell, completely unabashed disingenuousness they display (e.g., the history of public statements made every time this has happened going back almost to their founding days).
But I'm surprised people think entity like Facebook, Google and any other web businesses delete records permanently. It's not worth it on so many level:
- People that actually want to retrieve their stuff,
- It's harder to implement a full delete than it is to add a flag,
- They would have to give up on data-mining assets.
I don't endorse, but I understand.