Most recently, Discord's been discovered to have worked with Peter Thiel-backed company Persona, which itself is embroiled in multiple scandals. These include allegations that it was keeping personal identifying data from Discord users longer than was initially stated, and a reveal that the company accidentally left some of its data available to view on the open internet. Discord now says it's backing away from its partnership with Persona, but is it worth sticking around after all this?
According to reporting from PCGamer, the information came to light following reports that some UK-based Discord users had gotten requests to submit information to Persona, which prompted concerns about their facial data leaving their devices despite the initial announcement's promise that only government ID data would go to the cloud, as well as how long any uploaded data would stay in the cloud. In a now-deleted support page, Discord clarified that the partnership was indeed real and part of an experiment, and added the note about the potential seven-day window for deletion, which contradicted statements that uploaded data would be deleted directly after age verification.
Over the weekend, a trio of hacktivists also discovered a vulnerability in Persona's data front end, which—according to analysis from independent publication The Rage and anti-malware organization Malwarebytes—left 2,456 files accessible to the open internet. Both the hackers and Persona's CEO, who have been in "good faith" communication, say that Persona itself was not hacked, and that the data was accidentally leaked and viewable to anyone with the know-how to find it (it has since been deleted).
Granted, it's possible that Persona was not implementing all of these checks on users submitting age verification information via Discord, or keeping data for longer than the seven days mentioned on the now deleted support page. But it has not been a good look for either Persona or Discord.
Discord is ending its relationship with Persona
The company told Ars Technica that only a "small number of users was included in the experiment" involving Persona, and that it "ran for less than one month." More importantly, now that the experiment is purportedly over, Discord told both Ars and The Verge that it is no longer partnering with Persona, and that it will "keep our users informed as vendors are added or updated."
Is it safe to stick with Discord?
While it's unclear the extent to which Persona was storing or analyzing user data, that it came as a surprise to so many users has been enough to see a massive increase in users trying alternatives like Teamspeak, which itself has taken the opportunity to criticize Discord's security.
But even if you divest from Discord, it should be noted that, depending on the services you use in your life, you might still have to interact with Persona. While Discord will no longer work with the age verification company, Persona still has active relationships with social media sites including Reddit and LinkedIn, games like Roblox, and even payment service Square and access management platform Okta.
At any rate, as the internet becomes more connected and age verification becomes more common, flipping one switch, like divesting from a single app, likely isn't enough to fully wipe your online presence anymore. It's worth controlling what you can—Discord lets you delete information like sent messages or server channels—but it's legally obligated to retain purchase information, and also chooses to retain additional information such as database backups as well, even after account deletion. You can see a full list of retained Discord information on the company's website.
In the meantime, check out these 10 tips from my colleague Pranay Parab for staying secure while online.
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