WordPress not deleting my media

  • multimediacontentcreator · Member ·

    I have noticed this before and it has caused me some harm and aggravation from online trolls from one forum that I am no longer a part of where they downloaded a bunch of personal files somehow I was unable to protect or even set as private and were not even set to display on any of my pages or blog posts. Yet even after deleting them these people were able to download this info and who knows if they used my resume or anything else for their own gain like passing them off as their own. Now I have noticed the problem continues.

    Just today I uploaded a former cover letter of mine and noticed it was outdated and thus deleted it but before I did, it had like three downloads and it continues to be accessible even if not being accessible within my media folder and deleted. Which seems totally against any sort of sense and may even violate privacy rights or other rights.

    If you want proof here it is:
    This page is accessible but not in my media files:

    Click to access mycoverlettergeneral.pdf

    Here is proof showing a gif me trying to delete it again and not finding it:

    [img]https://maciejdurajjournalism.files.wordpress.com/2020/06/wordpressnotdeletingfiles.gif[/img]

    I am thinking of writing about this on Medium or something because this is not right.

    The blog I need help with is: (visible only to logged in users)

  • kokkieh · Staff ·

    Hi there,

    The file at https://maciejdurajjournalism.files.wordpress.com/2020/06/mycoverlettergeneral.pdf is no longer on our servers. If I try to visit it I just see a 404 page not found error. So it was properly and completely deleted.

    If it’s still loading for you, it’s likely because it’s still stored in your browser’s cache. Anyone else who recently viewed that file would likewise be able to access it via their browser cache. This would still generate a view/download stat on your site, because the cached copy of that page also includes the stats tracking pixel we use to record stats. We have no access to your browser, nor the browsers of any of your site visitors, to remove the file there.

    Also note that deleting a file from your media library does not remove copies of that file that might be cached elsewhere on the web, for example, in Google search results. So it can be possible for someone to access a deleted file even months later by searching for a cached copy in Google.

    We have no ability to remove files from Google’s cache. You’ll have to contact Google support directly to have it removed from there:

    https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/9689846?hl=en&visit_id=637286732535820538-2310492449&rd=1

  • multimediacontentcreator · Member ·

    I see it is gone now. It took a whole day though for it to give me that 404 error and in the WordPress cos it said people were still downloading it during the same period or even after I deleted it.

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