# How to always allow users to delete their own accounts?
**URL:** https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-always-allow-users-to-delete-their-own-accounts/278348
**Category:** Support
**Created:** [September 8, 2023, 3:40pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-always-allow-users-to-delete-their-own-accounts/278348 "2023-09-08T15:40:17Z")
**Posts on this page:** 19
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@RBoy](https://meta.discourse.org/u/RBoy)
#### Post date: [September 8, 2023, 3:40pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-always-allow-users-to-delete-their-own-accounts/278348/1 "2023-09-08T15:40:17Z")
Do you how to always allow users to delete their own accounts? this helps with GDPR compliance. Can we use -1 or 0 for `delete user max post age` and `delete user self max post count` so that users can do this anytime?
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### Author:  [@Lilly](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Lilly)
#### Post date: [September 8, 2023, 3:49pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-always-allow-users-to-delete-their-own-accounts/278348/2 "2023-09-08T15:49:39Z")
Hi @RBoy, this is discussed in this topic
> [@Option for user to delete themselves?](https://meta.discourse.org/t/option-for-user-to-delete-themselves/145855/4):
>
> The short version is that established accounts with a post history have to request deletion, because it can otherwise severely impact a community. If you were the OP to a long standing topic, and your deletion annihilated the entire topic that would be problematic. Community managers need to assess the impact and take any necessary precautions prior to deletion. Communities aren’t like email accounts or file sharing services, you have the right to request your account and any PII be removed, b…
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### Author:  [@Moin](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Moin)
#### Post date: [September 8, 2023, 3:57pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-always-allow-users-to-delete-their-own-accounts/278348/3 "2023-09-08T15:57:19Z")
Users can always request to delete their accounts.
Also, there is a #Customization > Theme component that makes this more obvious.
> [@Account Deletion Request](https://meta.discourse.org/t/account-deletion-request/245037):
>
> information_sourceSummary Add Account Deletion Request dropdown to account page.hammer_and_wrenchRepository [GitHub - VaperinaDEV/discourse-account-deletion-request: Add Account Deletion Request dropdown to account page. · GitHub](https://github.com/VaperinaDEV/discourse-account-deletion-request)questionInstall Guide [How to install a theme or theme component](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-do-i-install-a-theme-or-theme-component/63682)open_bookNew to Discourse Themes? [Beginner’s guide to using Discourse Themes](https://meta.discourse.org/t/beginners-guide-to-using-discourse-themes/91966) Hello wave This is a theme component to add an account deletion request dropdown to the accoun…
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### Author:  [@RBoy](https://meta.discourse.org/u/RBoy)
#### Post date: [September 8, 2023, 6:06pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-always-allow-users-to-delete-their-own-accounts/278348/4 "2023-09-08T18:06:55Z")
So from reading the linked topics am I right that users cannot delete their own accounts after XXX days have passed or XXX posts has been posted by them? The only way is for them to manually send a request to the admin?
@codinghorror I read your comments about this, it would be great to allow an option to allow users to delete their accounts, there could be 2 options be provided which would let the site admins decide on what’s appropriate for them (to comply with legal requirements or their own policies, e.g. to keep overhead low).
1. Allow users to delete their accounts and all posts (yes it may impact the community, but that decision should be left to the site owners, if they are okay losing that information as a trade off to reducing overhead and legal liability, then should be allowed to enable this option)
2. Allow users to delete their account but retain all posts as an anonymized account
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### Author:  [@Stephen](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Stephen)
#### Post date: [September 8, 2023, 7:08pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-always-allow-users-to-delete-their-own-accounts/278348/5 "2023-09-08T19:08:22Z")
Isn’t that exactly what’s achieved by the methods discussed above?
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### Author:  [@JammyDodger](https://meta.discourse.org/u/JammyDodger)
#### Post date: [September 8, 2023, 7:28pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-always-allow-users-to-delete-their-own-accounts/278348/6 "2023-09-08T19:28:08Z")
> [@RBoy](#):
>
> Can we use -1 or 0 for `delete user max post age` and `delete user self max post count` so that users can do this anytime?
Using -1 in `delete user self max post count` will disable the ability for users to self-delete, though you can set it really high to achieve a similar thing:
And `delete user max post age` can also be jacked up quite high as well (0 would effectively disallow user deletion):
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### Author:  [@ClawdiaWolf](https://meta.discourse.org/u/ClawdiaWolf)
#### Post date: [September 9, 2023, 2:23am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-always-allow-users-to-delete-their-own-accounts/278348/7 "2023-09-09T02:23:27Z")
Having actually done what @JammyDodger has said on one of my communities I _strongly_ recommend against it unless you fully trust your users not to abuse it.
We had to return the settings to the defaults after we kept having people get upset because they did not like the responses they were getting so they would delete their _accounts_ when they found out they could not delete their own topics.
That said, if you can fully trust your users not to abuse it, it can be helpful in some cases. 🙂
Just one small suggestion: if you’re going to modify those settings, make sure your modify the related site settings that control when staff can delete accounts as well to be consistent.
In particular, make sure you set these settings the same:
```plaintext
delete all posts max
```
```plaintext
delete user self max post count
```
If you set the former lower than the latter you get the curious situation where the user can self-delete but staff can’t delete the account.
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### Author:  [@supermathie](https://meta.discourse.org/u/supermathie)
#### Post date: [September 9, 2023, 2:46am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-always-allow-users-to-delete-their-own-accounts/278348/8 "2023-09-09T02:46:29Z")
> [@ClawdiaWolf](#):
>
> the curious situation where the user can self-delete but staff can’t delete the account
My first thought was “we should fix that” but then I realised that for someone it might actually be a desirable scenario 🤔
> **[Workflow](https://xkcd.com/1172/)**
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### Author:  [@ClawdiaWolf](https://meta.discourse.org/u/ClawdiaWolf)
#### Post date: [September 9, 2023, 3:09am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-always-allow-users-to-delete-their-own-accounts/278348/9 "2023-09-09T03:09:27Z")
Ah, one of my favorite xkcd strips 🙂
And yeah, I can think of some situations where you would actually want users able to self-delete but limit staff to only have the option to anonymize the account.
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### Author:  [@JammyDodger](https://meta.discourse.org/u/JammyDodger)
#### Post date: [September 9, 2023, 5:05am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-always-allow-users-to-delete-their-own-accounts/278348/12 "2023-09-09T05:05:48Z")
> [@ClawdiaWolf](#):
>
> Having actually done what @JammyDodger has said on one of my communities I _strongly_ recommend against it unless you fully trust your users not to abuse it.
Yeah, I can certainly imagine situations where this approach could get messy. Though if a forum admin felt strongly enough about it, and accepted the risks, the options are there.
Personally, I think the defaults are a pretty good flow (and the [Account Deletion Request](https://meta.discourse.org/t/account-deletion-request/245037) button is a nice addition too).
> [@ClawdiaWolf](#):
>
> And yeah, I can think of some situations where you would actually want users able to self-delete but limit staff to only have the option to anonymize the account.
This makes sense to me too. I think if a site has taken this decision it has generally come from a place where they want the user to have the ability even if it’s painful for the forum as a whole. If the user decides to push the button then it’s something they have to accept/tolerate, whereas it may not be something they want to encourage as a staff policy.
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### Author:  [@RBoy](https://meta.discourse.org/u/RBoy)
#### Post date: [September 11, 2023, 4:49pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-always-allow-users-to-delete-their-own-accounts/278348/13 "2023-09-11T16:49:59Z")
These options will only allow the user to delete their own posts. However for GDPR/CA compliance if a user wants to delete their own account, it’s forcing the admin to intervene. I would like to setup a process where in I would like the give the user the option to delete their own account and have discourse automatically anonymize it so we don’t lose the history but at the same time comply with the user’s wish to delete their account - without admin intervention. Is this possible?
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### Author:  [@supermathie](https://meta.discourse.org/u/supermathie)
#### Post date: [September 11, 2023, 4:56pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-always-allow-users-to-delete-their-own-accounts/278348/14 "2023-09-11T16:56:37Z")
Not in the default UI.
Our customers that need to automate it set up a central GDPR account deletion page external to Discourse that deletes the account across all of their systems, including their Discourse site. This is accomplished via a[call to the API](https://docs.discourse.org/#tag/Admin/operation/anonymizeUser) from their central compliance engine.
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### Author:  [@RBoy](https://meta.discourse.org/u/RBoy)
#### Post date: [September 11, 2023, 5:05pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-always-allow-users-to-delete-their-own-accounts/278348/15 "2023-09-11T17:05:42Z")
Thanks for clarifying that. Would it possible to include this option as a configurable option in the admin settings UI? It would be super helpful have 2 options available for the site admins:
1. Always allow users to delete their accounts and all posts permanently
2. Always allow users to delete their accounts and anonymize all posts
It would be very valuable add for compliance as ease to maintenance. Are these hard to implement?
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### Author:  [@anon65426961](https://meta.discourse.org/u/anon65426961)
#### Post date: [September 11, 2023, 6:31pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-always-allow-users-to-delete-their-own-accounts/278348/16 "2023-09-11T18:31:39Z")
For GDPR compliance anonymization may be enough, and that is a different option than deletion if an account is fully deleted than there is nothing left to anonymize.
I’m not a lawyer and not offering legal advise.
One risk to consider is also if there is ever unauthorized access to an account, that would be a problem if account is permanently deleted and cannot be recovered by someone other than the authorized individual for that account.
This may be a reason why they have some safeguards in place and full account deletion must be requested first and then reviewed first to make sure it is valid.
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### Author:  [@JammyDodger](https://meta.discourse.org/u/JammyDodger)
#### Post date: [September 11, 2023, 6:43pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-always-allow-users-to-delete-their-own-accounts/278348/17 "2023-09-11T18:43:45Z")
> [@anon65426961](#):
>
> One risk to consider is also if there is ever unauthorized access to an account, that would be a problem if account is permanently deleted and cannot be recovered by someone other than the authorized individual for that account.
>
> This may be a reason why they have some safeguards in place and full account deletion must be requested first and then reviewed first to make sure it is valid.
I’m not sure that makes sense. Though I think the reasons why have been covered pretty well in the previous posts and linked topics if you have a read back through. 👍
> [@RBoy](#):
>
> Thanks for clarifying that. Would it possible to include this option as a configurable option in the admin settings UI? It would be super helpful have 2 options available for the site admins:
>
> 1. Always allow users to delete their accounts and all posts permanently
> 2. Always allow users to delete their accounts and anonymize all posts
>
> It would be very valuable add for compliance as ease to maintenance. Are these hard to implement?
There are a couple of #Contribute > Feature topics on this you may want to add your usecase/voice to:
> [@Add Account Deletion](https://meta.discourse.org/t/add-account-deletion/191233):
>
> Hi, Please include a standard feature for the user to delete his forum account. Also, changing the username becomes impossible after a certain number of messages were posted, as far as I know. This, combined, makes it impossible for the user to not leave digital traces. In many countries, it is legally granted to people to request the erasure of their personal data. [For example, here is EU regulation.](https://gdpr-info.eu/art-17-gdpr/)
> [@Users self-deleting/anonymizing?](https://meta.discourse.org/t/users-self-deleting-anonymizing/267657):
>
> Just received this oh so gracious “request” from a user: Delete my forum account, \*\*\*\* .. you have not given me any means to anonymize or delete the account, and there is no way to contact the moderators on your variant of this crap forum software. Ensure none of my personal data remains there. As a global admin, I can (and did) anonymize the account. And then I went to my own preferences to figure out what this person could have done for him/herself. And found… nothing. Did we forget to to…
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### Author:  [@Jagster](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Jagster)
#### Post date: [September 12, 2023, 3:38am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-always-allow-users-to-delete-their-own-accounts/278348/18 "2023-09-12T03:38:30Z")
> [@RBoy](#):
>
> However for GDPR/CA compliance if a user wants to delete their own account, it’s forcing the admin to intervene
It has nothing to do with GDPR.
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### Author:  [@anon65426961](https://meta.discourse.org/u/anon65426961)
#### Post date: [September 12, 2023, 4:25am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-always-allow-users-to-delete-their-own-accounts/278348/19 "2023-09-12T04:25:47Z")
Well my understanding is the GDPR does require that people can have their accounts anonymized, but not necessarily posts deleted.
Would advise general caution to anyone about giving out legal advise, that is a liability risk if what is said is not completely accurate.
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### Author:  [@JammyDodger](https://meta.discourse.org/u/JammyDodger)
#### Post date: [September 12, 2023, 4:44am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-always-allow-users-to-delete-their-own-accounts/278348/20 "2023-09-12T04:44:34Z")
Before this spirals into another GDPR debate, I think we should close it off here. 🙂 There are plenty of GDPR discussions already if people have a search. 👍
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### Author:  [@JammyDodger](https://meta.discourse.org/u/JammyDodger)
#### Post date: [September 12, 2023, 4:44am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/how-to-always-allow-users-to-delete-their-own-accounts/278348/21 "2023-09-12T04:44:39Z")