Re:Even years later, Twitter doesn’t delete direct messages
by Dylan16807 on Saturday February 16, 2019 @01:40AM
(#19177418)
It's not like throwing something in the garbage makes it immediately stop existing.
"It goes in the recycle bin, it'll be gone for good in a couple weeks" is perfectly intuitive, even if database flags are confusing.
When the user deletes something, it is not destroyed instantly. Instead, it is rendered inaccessible to a broad class or ordinary users. Meanwhile, the systems do still retain the ostensibly deleted data, even if for an hour or 30 minutes, while other, more powerful actors might still have the ability to access and read something the individual thinks is destroyed and gone forever.