Data Deletion for Your Product

Learn about data deletion for . Under various data protection and privacy regulations, you may be required to delete personal data of a constituent, such as in response to a GDPR right of erasure request. The following are examples of common requests, considerations, and related procedures to help you determine an action plan for complying with data erasure situations.

Not all deletion methods completely erase records from the database. Deleting a record may only move it to the Recycle Bin, and therefore personal data can still be accessed and restored. If you are required under a law or otherwise to ensure records are erased, be sure that you understand how record deletion works within Salesforce, and how to remove personal data from your instance in ways that meet your obligations.

We offer the following examples of common requests and considerations to help you plan how best to honor constituent requests around data deletion. These are only suggestions for your review, and not guaranteed steps for ensuring compliance with any legal rule.

Keep in mind that addressing constituent requests, including those provided for under the GDPR, can be challenging. A one-size-fits-all strategy may not always work, and you may need to adjust your approach when balancing organizational needs and legal obligations. For example, if exporting personal data to satisfy a GDPR data portability request may violate someone else’s rights, you might consider narrowing the fields in scope rather than exporting all data. If deleting personal data to satisfy a GDPR erasure request may conflict with other requirements around record preservation, you might consider anonymizing certain fields rather than wholesale deletion.

As always, there are pros and cons to each approach, including legal and business impacts and risks, and you are responsible for your own compliance obligations in your use of the Salesforce Services and Salesforce.org applications. You should work with your advisors, including legal counsel, to determine whether you are covered under a legal requirement, and come up with a compliance plan that’s best for your organization.

Salesforce resources:

• Data Deletion: Delete Personal Data
• Delete Records
• Recycle Bin
• Empty Specific Records out of the Recycle Bin
• Hard Delete Records
• Data Backup

Important Remember to review both Salesforce Platform documentation AND Salesforce.org product-specific documentation. In addition to the information provided in the table below, review:

• Data Deletion for Sales Cloud
• Data Deletion for Salesforce Platform