# Delete Your Data

![DeleteYourData trash-bin logo](/public/brand/delete-your-data/logo.svg)

Loose outline for Portland BSides. The through-line is autonomy: data collection is common, often hard to see, and still
something people can question and refuse.

## Your data is everywhere

### The trails we leave

![Devices, shopping, location, and browsing connected by red data trails](img/delete-your-data/trails.png)

- Everyday browsing, purchases, location, devices, and public records create data trails.
- A single detail can look harmless; linked details can become a revealing picture.
- The collection is often invisible at the moment it happens.

---

Open with recognizable examples. Keep the tone human: the point is not that people made a mistake by using modern
services, but that collection is built into ordinary life.

### Collection becomes a profile

![Anonymous data fragments assembled into a personal profile](img/delete-your-data/profile.png)

- Companies and intermediaries combine records across services and time.
- Inferences can outlive the context that produced them.
- The profile may travel farther than the person expects.

---

Show the difference between a fact someone knowingly shared and an inference assembled from many signals. Avoid claiming
that every organization has every data point.

## Why people want the data

### Data is valuable to someone

![A data factory turns collected records into predictions and commercial value](img/delete-your-data/value.png)

- Data can support advertising, analytics, scoring, personalization, and resale.
- More collection can mean more prediction and more opportunities to influence a choice.
- The incentives reward collecting and retaining more than a service strictly needs.

---

Describe the business incentives without treating every use as malicious. Ask who benefits, who carries the risk, and
who gets to decide.

### Risk grows with reuse and retention

![An overflowing archive contrasts with a smaller collection of retained records](img/delete-your-data/retention.png)

- A breach is one risk; unexpected reuse and exposure are others.
- A data point kept indefinitely can become useful in a future context the person never saw coming.
- Minimization reduces what can be misused, exposed, or inferred.

---

Move from the collector's incentives to the person's stakes. Use a simple lifecycle: collect, infer, share, retain,
delete.

## You can say no

### Consent needs a real choice

![A person chooses between clearly available paths for granting or refusing consent](img/delete-your-data/consent.png)

- A choice should be visible, understandable, and possible to change.
- Declining optional collection should not be disguised as a broken experience.
- Convenience and access can constrain choice; name that honestly.

---

Avoid promising that one click stops all collection. Distinguish required processing from optional tracking and
secondary use.

### Autonomy is the point

![A person sets a boundary around their personal space and data](img/delete-your-data/autonomy.png)

- Your data describes parts of your life; you should have a say in how it is used.
- Refusing collection, limiting use, and asking for deletion are exercises of agency.
- Privacy is not secrecy or guilt; it is room to make choices without unnecessary observation.

---

State the central claim plainly: you always have the right to say no, and the right to autonomy matters even when a
company makes saying no inconvenient.

## Practical next steps

### A small refusal toolkit

![Privacy controls, an account card, a key, and an eraser form a practical toolkit](img/delete-your-data/toolkit.png)

- Pause before granting optional permissions.
- Prefer services that explain collection and provide meaningful controls.
- Use available access, correction, opt-out, and deletion processes.
- Revisit account settings and remove accounts or data you no longer need.

---

Offer useful actions without implying that individual settings solve structural collection. Encourage people to start
with one high-value account or data broker request.

### Close: reclaim a choice

![A person discards unwanted data and moves forward with control](img/delete-your-data/choice.png)

- Notice the collection.
- Ask who benefits and how long the data stays useful.
- Choose what to share, what to limit, and what to ask to have deleted.

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Return to the opening examples. The desired ending is not fear; it is a practical sense that people can question the
default and exercise choice together.