I love these comments because they highlight the ambivalence of the HN commentariat. If google actually had copies of deleted user data, the privacy-minded would lose their heads. And they’d be right because there are all kinds of laws around this. Deleted user data has to be really gone, even from backups, within a finite time.

> they highlight the ambivalence of the HN commentariat

They don't.

This was:

a) Deliberately published (ie. not leaked)

b) By the uploader who is also the content creator (not e.g. doxing or copyright infringement)

c) Without breaching their own privacy (not e.g. posting a nude of themselves)

d) In this case possibly if not likely unlawful (hence warranting a police investigation)

e) For-profit (non-profit crimes have less priority)

Furthermore:

> Deleted user data has to be really gone, even from backups, within a finite time.

Sure, but we're talking -at this point- one or two days max here and we're talking about a scam.

There is no law (that I'm aware of in the US) that requires Google to purge any user data except GDPR (which applies only to EU residents after May 25, 2018), or perhaps the EU's "right to be forgotten" (which isn't going to supersede preserving evidence for an investigation).

Those Youtube videos exist, if not with a "is_deleted" flag, in Youtube backups. Some are already in the Internet Archive.

I'd rather websites did not keep my private data when I delete my account but I have no problem with the archival of public content. Of course with social networks pushing their users to overshare all the time the line can be pretty fuzzy with comment history and things like that but I don't see how anybody could consider archiving a video published on Youtube as a breach of user privacy.

You put something up voluntarily on the open internet, you lose your right to keeping that thing private.