I do not feel comfortable with SOTA anymore. There are too many rules that make no sense for me. How do I delete my SOTA account completely?
73, Alfred, OE5AKM
Stop logging in.
That is unhelpful, it’s probably also a breach of the Data protection act.
Colin, you spend your life sniping at the MT and me in particular. You are not happy with how this award scheme is run so I suggest you go elsewhere whilst the choice is yours and before it is forced on you.
1 Like
Gentlemen, please remember the Acceptable use policy. No exchanges of personalities. This applies to all.
2 Likes
Walk to a summit that is in the database. Use what ever band, mode and power your licence permits. Portable power only. Get minimum of 4 QSO to qualify. Leave the summit. Enter your log in database (optional) to earn points. Simple!
Best of luck anyway. 73 Neil
Perhaps a little time away and leave it all in place and have some time out away from Sota and may be come back when you feel more comfortable about it. If not, carry on with what you intend to do in first place.
Don’t burn your bridge just yet. The rules take a little getting used to but work for me and provide me with a challenge I enjoy doing and leave the internal politics to other people and enjoy the summit hunting.
karl 73s
1 Like
I’m surprised if there isn’t a way to delete your account and leave no footprint? Even Facebook lets you delete your account if you wish!
Facebook doesn’t delete accounts, it merely hides them.
We have a perfectly effective way of dealing with requests to remove accounts. The first stage is to stop logging in and using them. Then, when it’s not being used and we can see it’s not being used we can do our stuff. You would be surprised the number of people who demand (not in this case) we delete an account “right now” and then come back asking for their data to be restored.
So the first thing is to do what you are requested to do, stop logging in. It’s not hard or a terribly difficult thing to do.
1 Like
That used to be the case. They offer a “suspend” option and a full “delete” option now, under user choice. Now, if they are retaining data it would be hard for us mere users to prove… 
Is this process written down anywhere for users to access?
If you warn people that their data is irretrievable and they don’t take a copy themselves first then “tough”. Even if they squeal later they only have themselves to blame.
Will be away Thursday to Thursday, no taking radio.
Having time away and going to enjoy it with the other half
Happy Sota-ing one and all
karl 73s
Interesting, I regretted signing up to it in college for that simple reason.
Nobody seems to have considered that you cannot do a “full delete” in the sense that every contact appears twice, once under chases and once under activations. An account might be inactivated or hidden but the data regarding contacts remains in the system.
Interesting.
If I chose to remove all my activations and chases from the system I could do? It would leave them as the counterpart entries for the chasers and activators in their own logs, but “my” end of the QSL would disappear.
I don’t know what the original poster is trying to achieve. Whether it is the Database, SOTAWatch Reflector, something else, or a combination of these.
Spend a lot of time on data management over the years. Modifying data often invokes the “law of unintended consequence”.
There is a QSO matching feature in the SOTA Database, but that aspect is not and has never been a requirement of scoring points or claiming awards.
It is perfectly simply to delete your own records from the system. You simply call up your logs and click “Delete” next to each one. It’s up to you to put them there in the first place, and it’s up to you to remove them again should you so desire.
Then, as Andy explains, simply don’t use or access your accounts any more. After a suitable period of “quiet”, if you really don’t want any trace on the systems, contact us again via private email and request it.
However, it is unlikely anyone can be completely removed from the system. Your callsign is likely to still appear in the activator and chaser logs of other participants.
Regards what the original poster is trying to achieve, I’d have thought that was obvious. All the above can be done privately and quietly, so to request it via a new thread on the public reflector suggests other motives to me. I always wonder when someone who claims to want nothing to do with something, goes to that something to announce it in the most public way possible 
Just out of curiosity I looked for your callsign Alfred (OE5AKM) in my computerised SOTA logs for the last 11 years and in the SOTA database records for Austria, chaser and activator. Either there are no logs there, or they have now been removed or you have not been active under that callsign in SOTA on HF as far as I can tell. I also wondered why you aren’t comfortable with SOTA anymore, its got me wondering I have to say Alfred…
Maybe you are so uncomfortable that you will never again visit this reflector, in which case you will not read my enquiring message…
73 Phil
2 Likes
Phil,
If you read the other thread about the use of repeaters in SOTA, then you will see that Alfred has been in SOTA since 2004, but doesn’t log his activations.
73, Gerald G4OIG
But why? I know it is up to the activators to log if they wish but why for so long and never log at all. A bit pointless joining in the first place I would have thought. I don’t log all my summits because some of the activations aren’t really activations because I may have done the hill previously and just happen to be on a SOTA summit with a handheld but do state on air to chasers that I won’t be uploading a log for the summit. But that is very rarely - maybe once or twice a year.
73 Neil
OK Gerald
I never use repeaters, so I didn’t read that thread.
73 Phil
Hmm… If a tree falls in the woods and there is no one there, does it make any sound?
I’ll get my coat…
73 Marc G0AZS