GDPR Request for erasing data - what should I do?

Help and Feedback Scripting Support
#1

I have recieved an message on roblox telling me to erase someones data from my game, this means my data stores etc.

I have downloaded this plugin: DataStore Editor - Roblox and I have installed it and it asks for a name, so I fill it in with the UserID of the account in question.

Then I select the game and then another page comes up with me requesting for a key, so I input the UserID as some people have been saying that it should be that, and it seems it is incorrect.

I used to have another game before I overrided it with my main game, which did have a key.

(I have never done this before, or recieved a message from roblox to do this, so this is very new for me).

Edit: I have now managed to remove all of the instances inside of the datastore that related to the users ID, thanks so much for everyone here helping me and making me understand a lot about this than I would of done prior to this post.

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#2

roblox would never ask you to this

edit: I stand corrected, sorry

#3

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Roblox sends these messages regularly for users who request their data to be deleted.

#4

That is the exact message I have got, but I have never been asked to do this before.

This is why I am unsure what to do, and how to do it.

Would a good solution be to email roblox support and ask for their assistance on how to do this?

#5

Just run this console command in Roblox Studio

game:GetService("DataStoreService") :GetDataStore("YOUR_DATASTORE_NAME_HERE"):SetAsync("The_key_for_the_player", {})

Just change the “DATASTORE_NAME” to yours and the Key to the player’s key. You dont need to do anything if your game doesnt save data.

2 Likes
#6

The mail you received directly tells you what you need to do:

Please delete this User ID immediately from all of your records (e.g. games, data stores, etc.) as this is an obligation under data protection laws.

You need to go through every one of your games and clear any data you associated with that user, either directly via a username / user ID or not.

@Kullaske 's code won’t work because this is entirely dependent on the implementation of data stores in your games.

For more information, see here.

#8

I know that I am needed to delete these, but I am just unsure how to do this.

I am not too sure how I would be able to do this, as I have never been requested to do this before.

#9

Setting a datastore key to nil will remove the data, regardless of your datastoring interface. As long as you know the key, and aren’t saving to multiple keys, this is sufficient.

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#10

If you know how to save the data in the first place, you know how to wipe data as well.

For each game, you need to see how you initially saved the user data in your data persistence scripts. You should have needed to construct a string key from either their username or user ID, because this is literally the only GUID we get for players in Roblox.

As stated by others, you must then set the data at that key to nil. Make sure you do this for every game on your profile that could possibly have saved data, and for every key where data is stored.

#11

I have found the key of what the data is saving to, will this be the same for every single user?

#12

Each key is (or should be) unique to the user. It’s common to use the players user ID as a key.

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#14

I know which game the saving is being done for, as I have had only one which has done this.

I am just unsure as I have no longer been using the game, as I have overwritten this with another game (which doesn’t use a database).

Anyway, thanks for your help.

#15

If you dont use a database, then you have nothing to worry about. You can simply ignore the message sent by Roblox.

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#16

You are most welcome, I am just wondering what I can do to remove this, as I don’t want to get into trouble for having this sort of data which shouldn’t be there.

#17

If you just overwrote the place with another, the place still contains the user data in its data stores. Even though this data is not accessible in the current version of the game, it still exists, and tou are in violation of the GDPR Right to Erasure unless you clear them.

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#18

As far as I know, no one has gotten in trouble from an erase request. There isn’t a whole lot they can do to enforce it.

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#19

Oh alright, I have overwritten a game WITH a database with one that doesn’t (I did this a while back), so would the database still be there?

Sorry for sounding like I don’t know anything, lua isn’t my strongest language as I have only just started to learn it during quarantine.

#20

Well I am still going to resolve this issue as I respect peoples data, but I appreciate the comment nonetheless.

1 Like
#21

Ah, that makes sense now.

Thanks so much for clearing tons of things up for me, I now know what to do and how to do it.

#22

Thanks so much to everyone has replied to this thread, it has sure helped me know a lot about this, and I think it has helped many others who might have some questions about it.

Edit: I have used about 4 methods to remove the UserID from all of my datastores (as I wanted to make sure they was for sure gone), all of the keys were the UserID so it was alright to do. I then verified if it was still there by doing a script which someone else suggested on the devforum and it came back as blank (which meant there was 0 results found).

So yeah, thanks so much for everyones help as it sure helped me delete their data successfully and will help many other developers going through the same issues resolve it.