Delete from the WPFolks app
- Open the WPFolks app and go to Settings.
- Tap Delete account.
- Confirm. Your account is deleted straight away.
Delete from the website
- Go to Settings, then Danger Zone.
- Find Delete your account, at the bottom.
- Enter your current password and type DELETE to confirm.
Both routes run the same thing behind the scenes, so it makes no difference which you use.
If you cannot sign in
Write to support@wpfolks.org from the email address on the account. I will reply from the same address to confirm it is you, and delete the account once that is done. If you cannot write from that address, tell me your username and roughly when you joined, and I will ask a couple of questions only the account holder could answer. I will not delete an account on an unverified request.
What gets deleted
Permanently removed, immediately:
- Your account: name, username, email address and password.
- Your profile: bio, avatar, skills, links, availability and every other profile field.
- Direct messages. Whole conversations you were part of are deleted, not just your side of them.
- Follows, in both directions: who you followed and who followed you.
- Notifications, both the ones you received and the ones you caused for other folks.
- Your location, including the approximate coordinates used for Nearby folks and the member map.
- Push notification tokens for every device you signed in on.
- App sessions. Every device sign-in is revoked.
- Your votes, reactions and event RSVPs.
- Your leaderboard score, rank and streak history.
What stays, without your name on it
Some things you posted are part of conversations other folks took part in. Deleting those outright would tear holes in threads that are not yours alone, so the content stays and the authorship is removed instead. It is reassigned to an anonymous placeholder account and can no longer be traced to you through WPFolks.
- Community feed posts.
- Comments and replies. Your name, email address and IP are cleared from them.
- Anything you submitted to a directory: plugins, themes, snippets, resources, events, jobs, businesses.
If you want a directory submission taken down entirely rather than anonymised, delete it before you delete your account, or ask and I will remove it.
The one record kept
A single deletion record is kept: the date, the internal ID the account used to have, and a one-way cryptographic hash of the email address. There is no way to read an email address back out of a hash. It exists so that if a deletion is ever questioned, there is proof it happened and when. It contains nothing readable about you.
How long it takes
Immediately. There is no waiting period and no grace period, which also means there is no undo. Once it runs, the account is gone and cannot be restored. You will get one confirmation email.
Ordinary encrypted server backups may hold a copy for up to 30 days before they rotate out. Those are never used to restore a deleted account.
If you just want a break
Deleting is permanent. If you only want to step back, deactivate instead: your profile and content are hidden from everyone and you stop receiving email and push, but nothing is destroyed and you can reactivate whenever you like by signing back in. That option is in Settings, then Danger Zone too.
Questions
Write to support@wpfolks.org. The privacy policy explains what is collected in the first place.