Privacy & Data Retention

Sunshine Photo Cart includes privacy tools that help you comply with data protection regulations like GDPR. These settings control what happens when customers request their data be erased, how you can remove personal data in bulk, and how long personal data is retained.

Where to Find These Settings

1. Go to Sunshine > Settings > Privacy

Account Erasure Requests

WordPress includes a built-in tool for handling personal data erasure requests (under Tools > Erase Personal Data). When you process an erasure request for a customer, this setting controls how Sunshine handles their order data.

Remove Personal Data from Orders

When checked, processing an erasure request will remove the customer's personal information (name, email, address, etc.) from their orders. The order records themselves are kept for your bookkeeping, but the identifying details are stripped out.

When unchecked, order personal data is retained even after an erasure request is processed. This may be necessary if you need to keep complete order records for tax or legal purposes.

Personal Data Removal

Allow Bulk Removal of Personal Data

When checked, an option is added to the orders screen that lets you remove personal data from multiple orders at once. This is useful for periodic cleanup of old orders.

Important: Removing personal data cannot be undone. Once removed, the customer's name, email, address, and other identifying information is permanently deleted from those orders.

Personal Data Retention

These settings let you define how long personal data is kept when it's no longer needed. After the specified period, data becomes eligible for cleanup.

Retain Inactive Customer Accounts

How long to keep customer accounts that have had no activity. Leave blank to retain inactive accounts indefinitely.

Retain Completed Orders

How long to keep personal data in completed orders. Leave blank to retain order data indefinitely.

For both settings, you specify a duration (number and unit — for example, 12 months or 2 years).

Delete Expired Galleries After

Enter a number of days. Galleries that passed their expiration date more than this many days ago will be permanently deleted — including all their images. This runs automatically once per day.

Leave the field blank to keep expired galleries indefinitely.

Important: This deletes the entire gallery, not just personal data. Make sure you've downloaded any images you need before they're removed. If you only want to hide galleries after they expire (without deleting them), use the Gallery Expiration feature on its own and leave this setting blank.

Notes

• Retention cleanup runs automatically once per day. When accounts, orders, or galleries reach the end of their retention period, they are permanently removed on the next daily run.
• The account and order retention settings only affect personal data. Order totals, product details, and other non-personal business records are always retained.
• The expired gallery setting deletes the entire gallery and its images, not just personal data.
• WordPress's built-in erasure tool (Tools > Erase Personal Data) is the standard way to process individual customer requests.
• If you're unsure about data retention requirements, consult with a legal professional about the regulations that apply in your jurisdiction.