No such thing as "deleted" on the Internet

by Nauman Umair Khan | May 24, 2009 at 12:03 am

2553 views | 71 Recommendations | 2 comments

Yeah, there is no such thing as "deleted" on the internet. Shocked? So was I when I read the following article on Yahoo Tech.

The research has been done by researchers at Cambridge University who have found that nearly half of the social networking sites don't immediately delete pictures when a user requests they be removed.

User photographs can still be found on many social networking sites even after people have deleted them, Cambridge University researchers have said.

And, it's not like a WWE thing that you shouldn't try at home, yup, you can try it at home to mark this research's validity. So, the following article is a must read, especially the lesson part. ; )

It's always fun to write about research that you can actually try out for yourself.
Try this: Take a photo and upload it to Facebook, then after a day or so, note what the URL to the picture is (the actual photo, not the page on which the photo resides), and then delete it. Come back a month later and see if the link works. Chances are: It will.

Facebook isn't alone here. Researchers at Cambridge University (so you know this is legit, people!) have found that nearly half of the social networking sites don't immediately delete pictures when a user requests they be removed. In general, photo-centric websites like Flickr were found to be better at quickly removing deleted photos upon request.

Why do "deleted" photos stick around so long? The problem relates to the way data is stored on large websites: While your personal computer only keeps one copy of a file, large-scale services like Facebook rely on what are called content delivery networks to manage data and distribution. It's a complex system wherein data is copied to multiple intermediate devices, usually to speed up access to files when millions of people are trying to access the service simultaneously. (Yahoo! Tech is served by dozens of servers, for example.) But because changes aren't reflected across the CDN immediately, ghost copies of files tend to linger for days or weeks.

In the case of Facebook, the company says data may hang around until the URL in question is reused, which is usually "after a short period of time." Though obviously that time can vary considerably.

Of course, once a photo escapes from the walled garden of a social network like Facebook, the chances of deleting it permanently fall even further. Google's caching system is remarkably efficient at archiving copies of web content, long after it's removed from the web. Anyone who's ever used Google Image Search can likely tell you a story about clicking on a thumbnail image, only to find that the image has been deleted from the website in question -- yet the thumbnail remains on Google for months. And then there are services like the Wayback Machine, which copy entire websites for posterity, archiving data and pictures forever.

The lesson: Those drunken party photos you don't want people to see? Simply don't upload them to the web, ever, because trying to delete them after you sober up is a tough proposition.

Yes, someday there will be jobs for the thought police to seek and find. How boring to sit and read and read and read and then BAM! Something someone can be arrested for. I can't help but remember a scripture that is in the New Testament about not one jot or tittle is ever lost...all can be seen and in Primal Therapy "they" say our "self" can remember everything..(even in the womb some say). We are the most important for recollection of all we do and say. It also makes one realize ..perhaps...ultimately we will be our own Judges and Pardoners. If we don't then may Grace come to us.

Here it tis:

The more familiar language of the King James Version (1611) renders that verse as:

For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.

A jot is the name of the least letter of an alphabet or the smallest part of a piece of writing. It is the Anglicized version of the Greek iota - the smallest letter of the Greek alphabet, which corresponds to the Roman 'i'. This, in turn, was derived from the Hebrew word jod, or yodr, which is the the smallest letter of the square Hebrew alphabet. Apart from its specialist typographical meaning, we still use the word jot more generally to mean 'a tiny amount'. Hence, when we have a brief note to make, we 'jot it down'.

A tittle, rather appropriately for a word which sounds like a combination of tiny and little, is smaller still. It refers to a small stroke or point in writing or printing. In classical Latin this applied to any accent over a letter, but is now most commonly used as the name for the dot over the letter 'i'. It is also the name of the dots on dice. In medieval calligraphy the tittle was written as quite large relative to the stem of the 'i'. Since fixed typeface printing was introduced in the 15th century the tittle has been rendered smaller.

The use of the word 'dot' as a small written mark didn't begin until the 18th century. We may have been told at school to dot our i's; Chaucer and Shakespeare would have been told to tittle them.

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albertacowpoke

at 03:32 on May 24th, 2009

Thanks for this Nauman. A good post.

ricknight

at 03:46 on May 24th, 2009

Rule#1 assume there is a copy on the Internet of everything you have ever sent, uploaded, or typed on it, regardless of your privacy settings.

Act accordingly.

QueensHart

at 07:18 on May 24th, 2009

NowPublic

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No such thing as "deleted" on the Internet

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