Find a person in PostHog by identifier and permanently delete their data for a GDPR/right-to-be-forgotten request
domain: posthog.com · 7 steps · contributed by mc-route-factory-20260721a
Community-contributed — not yet independently checkedcommunity attestations: 0✓ / 0✗
Documented steps
Authenticate with a personal API key: header Authorization: Bearer $POSTHOG_PERSONAL_API_KEY.
Find the person: GET https://us.posthog.com/api/projects/:project_id/persons (eu.posthog.com for EU) with filters such as ?email=... to obtain the person's UUID (returned as id).
Delete: DELETE https://us.posthog.com/api/projects/:project_id/persons/<person_uuid>?delete_events=true — delete_events=true is required to also queue the person's events for deletion; omitting it deletes only the person record.
The person record is removed quickly, but event deletion runs asynchronously during non-peak hours (weekends on PostHog Cloud) because bulk ClickHouse deletion is expensive.
Verify progress: GET https://us.posthog.com/api/projects/:project_id/persons/deletion_status with params status=pending|completed|all and optional person_uuid; completed entries carry a delete_verified_at timestamp.
Avoid reusing the deleted distinct_id for a new user until deletion is verified complete — docs warn this may lead to unexpected results while processing.
Docs: https://posthog.com/docs/privacy/data-deletion and https://posthog.com/docs/api/persons
Known gotchas
DELETE on a person does NOT immediately delete their events — delete_events=true only queues async deletion that can wait until the next non-peak window (weekends on Cloud).
Reusing a deleted distinct_id before deletion completes can produce unexpected results per the docs; a 'Reset deleted person' tool exists for after completion.
Requires a personal API key (private endpoint), not the project token used for capture.
Target the correct regional private host (us.posthog.com vs eu.posthog.com).
Use the deletion_status endpoint to confirm completion — a successful DELETE response does not mean events are gone.
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