this post was submitted on 09 Apr 2025
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How do we find out the cause of deleted posts not shown in the modlog? (lemmy.ml)
submitted 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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I'm just going through my past history, and looking for anything where the subject is "*Permanently Deleted*" and where the Modlog for that community shows nothing.

None of these appear in the modlog of their respective communities.

I've been told before in an earlier comment chain that this might be due to the post user being permanently deleted.

Is there any way I can verify this as an end-user? Once the post is gone, I can't see the username of who posted it.

It's just a bit of a small hole in the transparency of Lemmy's fantastic moderation

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 week ago (2 children)

"Permanently deleted" normally means the poster has removed their account and content. In this case, your comment hasn't been removed, but the post you were replying to is gone, because the person who made the post deleted their account. It reads permanently deleted, because that's now the post title in the database

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I had a look, seems like for the fedimemes post the poster got banned, and probably their post removed:

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 week ago (2 children)

They likely deleted their account after getting banned

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago (2 children)

That makes sense, but I'm just wondering if there's any way for an end-user such as myself can easily see this (e.g. modlog, userbanlog, or otherwise) to verify.

From my perspective, I hope you can understand how bewildering it is to have this record gap.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago (2 children)

There is no modlog, because there were no mod actions.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago

There was a mod action: lemmy.ml instance banned that account. It still exists on LW: https://lemmy.world/u/cm0002

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I understand, but is there no userbanlog to check as well, where a deleted post is tied to a banned user?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago (1 children)

That's what I'm saying. The post is gone because the user deleted their account. Everything about that account is gone. I believe it works that way due to European laws on the right to be forgotten.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Ah I see, so there never will be a userbanlog implemented due to GDPR?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Two separate things.

User bans already appear in the modlogs.

Self deleted accounts don't appear in anything, because they are truly erased.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

You know what I'm asking for, can you please meet me mid-way

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I am honestly confused.

The existing modlog already includes user bans.

Your comments were never removed, so they don't appear in a modlog.

You can't find the parent posts your comments were made on, because they are permanently deleted due to the poster deleting their account. These don't appear in the modlog, because they were removed by the user, not a mod. There was no reason to attach, because the reason is that the user deleted their account.

If the user had a post deleted by a mod before they then deleted their own account, it won't appear in the modlog, because both the user and the post in question have been removed from the system. If it was in the modlog, all you would be able to see is that an unknown user had some unknown content removed, or than an unknown user was banned, which is less than useful.

If what you're asking about isn't covered by that, then I genuinely don't understand the scenario you're trying to clarify

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Aim: Find out why a post is missing

Ideally: Deleted Post -> Deleted User -> Reason for deletion

Reality:

  1. The post is missing, this event does not show up in the modlog for posts
  2. One reason given is that the posts are purged when the user's account was deleted
  3. To verify this, one needs to know the poster's username in advance, but this info is not visible from the deleted post.
  4. ....
  5. Trawl through the modlog for deleted users and hope you find one connected to the post in question
  6. Take it on good faith that the user and all their posts were deleted for good reason.
[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago (1 children)

If you see "permanently deleted" in your post history, you know that it was removed because the person deleted their account.

Other than that, there isn't and can't really be any way of tracking that removal, without keeping data that the account owner has requested be deleted. Some clients cache removed content and continue to display it after its removed from the instance, but that only works if the client is explicitly coded to do so, and if the client happened to get a copy of the content before it was removed.

To verify this, one needs to know the poster's username in advance, but this info is not visible from the deleted post.

Your comments to their removed post will still show in your history, and the title of the post will be "permanently deleted". If you see that, you know that the user deleted their account. Of note, admins and mods of communities where the content was posted will still be able to view the post stub, to see the other replies to the post, but even they can't see the initial content.

Anything else will have a trail attached to the users ID. The API makes a difference between a user deleting their own post/comment (not account) and a mod doing the same. Many lemmy clients display them differently, though some display them the same, and others just hide as if it never existed in the first place. So in many clients, you can see that a user deleted their own post by the icon the client uses. You won't get any more information than that, because there is no requirement for a reason to be entered when removing your own content.

If a mod or admin removes it, it will show as being removed by mod action, and will generate a mod log.

There is also a purge option that will let a moderator completely purge a user, post or comment from their instance. This is used for accounts that post NSFL content. A purge won't leave a mod log trail, but purging doesn't federate. which means that the content will still be visible on remote instances (and the user can still continue to post if they are based on a remote instance). To remove remote content, the admin needs to issue a ban and content removal before the purge, and the ban will leave a mod log entry. This is only an option if the user was a local user, or for content they posted to a locally hosted community.

In theory, an admin could also remove content directly from the database, but that is basically the same as the purge process. It doesn't federate, so content remains visible on other instances, unless the admin issued a ban before getting in to the database, and then the ban will show in the log.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I guess I don't want to prolong this discussion too much, and I do thank you both for conversing with me so deep to this point.

I hope you can understand a little bit where I'm coming from, where a user such as myself cannot work out whether a post / account was purged due to a user being banned for NSFL content, or because mods are doing something nefarious. Unlike the modlog where decisions are transparent, we just have to take it on good faith that the user was bad.

I thank you for explaining the implementation difficulties in this regard. From the top-level, it does not seem that difficult to me to annotate a dead post with a comment about why a user was deleted (I'm assuming there's a user-deletion log somewhere at the admin instance-level (or even a shared user-ban-list propogated across instances?) this info can be pulled from), but I suppose I can understand how it might be an extra layer of complexity trying to sync such actions.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

it does not seem that difficult to me to annotate a dead post with a comment about why a user was deleted (I’m assuming there’s a user-deletion log somewhere at the admin instance-level (or even a shared user-ban-list propogated across instances?) this info can be pulled from), but I suppose I can understand how it might be an extra layer of complexity trying to sync such actions.

Feel free to open an issue on the Lemmy Github: https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/issues

This post has been quite interesting to be honest

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago

I sadly don't have a github :'-)

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

How else can you ensure that a user's data gets deleted when they delete their account?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago

In this very specific case, you would need to check your account profile from another instance (the way I did it, from my instance) to see those posts that would still exist but not on lemmy.ml as they've been banned.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

They still posted 6 hours ago: https://lemmy.world/u/cm0002

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

That image doesn't show "permanently deleted". Neither the comment in the screenshot nor the post the comment was attached to have been deleted. That appears to be a screenshot of a discussion about this issue, rather than an occurrence of it.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago

Ah indeed, seems to be a different case than the "permanently deleted"

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago

it's also the case for deletions without account deletions, but iirc there is some delay before it gets rewritten in the db to allow the user to undelete it for a bit of time.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I’ve been told before in an earlier comment chain that this might be due to the post user being permanently deleted.

This seems to have been deleted as well? https://lemmy.ml/post/27763393/17564094

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago (3 children)

What the actual hell. There's nothing in the fedimemes modlog for why it was deleted, and also, the post itself doesn't appear deleted in my history....

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago

I kind of remember this post, this it seems like it's been deleted as well. Something is weird here

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago

Also, do you remember what was the name of the AskLemmy thread from today? This one I can't see either

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

okay, so different instances can refer to the same post (or they clone it?) but each has their own visibility rules about it.

I guess that makes sense. Some kind of visibility guide or indicator would be fantastic here, I'm finding the loss of posts with (seemingly) no explanation a bit bewlidering

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago

they clone it?)

They clone it. Which means that if lemmy.ml ban a user, they are going to also remove their posts.

You can technically see it from the lemmy.ml modlog and looking at the "banned from site" action: https://lemmy.ml/modlog?page=1&actionType=ModBan&userId=790936

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

Is it deleted or removed?

Deleted means that the creator deleted it, which won't be logged to the modlog. Removed means a moderator or admin removed it, which will be logged to the modlog.

It could also be that the user was instance/community banned with the purge content option enabled. Which might confuse you, because the posts won't have a modlog entry regarding their removal. The purge content option's status is not logged along with their ban. So be sure to check if they are instance/community banned as well.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I had a look, seems like for the fedimemes post the poster got banned, and probably their post removed:

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Well then, there's the answer.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

That's the cause, which I did mention in my initial post - but I'm looking for a solution regarding how this could be a bit more transparent.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago

Well, the purge content status could be shown. I don't think there is a better way.