How long does Discord retain IP addresses for accounts?
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Executive summary
Discord’s public privacy policy says the company “retains personal information until we determine it is no longer needed for the processing purposes” and points users to a separate data‑retention policy for specifics [1]. Independent reporting and regulators have flagged past deficiencies: France’s CNIL fined Discord €800,000 in 2022 for lacking concrete retention periods and later required a written policy with account‑deletion rules such as removing inactive accounts after two years of inactivity in that remediation [2] [3].
1. What Discord officially says — no fixed IP timeframe
Discord’s privacy statements describe IP addresses as part of the device information they collect and say they keep “personal information until we determine it is no longer needed for the processing purposes… or for legal compliance,” but they do not publish a single, specific retention period for IP addresses inside the main privacy text; instead they refer readers to a separate data retention policy for details [1] [4].
2. The enforcement record that forced clearer rules
Regulatory scrutiny shows this vague approach mattered. The French data protection authority (CNIL) found Discord had no written retention policy and no defined retention periods for user data, citing millions of inactive French accounts; that enforcement led to a fine and to Discord producing a formal retention policy and promising account‑deletion after two years of inactivity for affected users [2] [3].
3. What third‑party guides and VPN vendors say — practical interpretations
Security and VPN vendor guides repeatedly treat IPs as data Discord keeps long enough to enforce bans and moderation: discussions of “IP bans” and how to circumvent or survive them assume Discord can and does block IPs and may suspend IPs for lengthy periods, with some consumer‑facing guides saying temporary IP suspensions can last “up to a year” [5] and others treating IP bans as effectively permanent until changed by Discord [6] [7]. These third‑party pages reflect user experience and mitigation tactics, not an official retention timetable from Discord [6] [5] [7].
4. How to read those mixed signals — policy vs. practice
The policy language gives Discord wide discretion: “until… no longer needed” and “for legal compliance” means retention can vary by purpose (security, fraud prevention, law enforcement requests, analytics) and jurisdictional requirements [1] [4]. In practice, that discretion can manifest as long technical logs for moderation or short retention for other uses; the CNIL action shows regulators interpret “no specific period” as unacceptable and can force formal retention schedules [2] [3].
5. What the sources don’t say — explicit IP lifespan not published
Available sources do not mention a published, single number of days, months, or years that Discord keeps IP addresses for all users. Discord’s main pages point to a data retention policy for specifics but the publicly quoted text in the provided materials does not include an IP‑specific retention period [1] [4]. No source here gives a definitive, company‑stated retention window for IP addresses.
6. Competing viewpoints and hidden agendas to watch
Company policy language serves the company’s operational and legal flexibility; that is an implicit agenda in the wording “until… no longer needed.” Independent vendors and VPN sites have a clear commercial interest in promoting services to evade bans or privacy checks, so their guidance (e.g., on using VPNs or proxies to change IPs) mixes practical tips with incentives to sell solutions [8] [6] [5]. Regulators like CNIL present a rights‑focused perspective and forced Discord to adopt clearer retention practices after finding gaps [2] [3].
7. Practical takeaways for users
If you need a firm answer for legal or privacy reasons, current public materials reviewed here show Discord does not publish a single universal retention period for IPs; instead retention depends on processing purpose and legal requirements [1] [4]. For concerns about bans or forensic use of IPs, third‑party guides and user experience reports treat IP data as retained long enough to be used for enforcement (sometimes described as up to a year or effectively permanent for severe cases), but those are not formal company retention statements [6] [5] [7].
Limitations: this analysis uses only the provided documents; I do not assert any company practices beyond what those sources state or regulatory findings confirm.