After a few days of confusion, Ubisoft finally clarified the inactive account deletion situation, confirming the criteria the company takes into consideration before an account is deleted.
In a new statement provided to Wccftech today, it was confirmed that Ubisoft takes 4 criteria into consideration before an account is deleted. These are the gaming activity of the account since its creation, the account's libraries, the duration of inactivity of the account, and the existence of an active subscription tied to the account. Regarding the account's libraries, Ubisoft confirmed that any account that includes purchased PC games is not eligible for deletion. Before the deletion is permanent, three emails are sent to the player, allowing them to restore their account within 30 days.
You can read the statement provided to us by Ubisoft in full below.
For many years now, we have implemented our account deletion process in compliance with the requirements of the GDPR (Article 5.1.e on the obligation to limit the data retention period). Our policies are aligned with legal requirements and with the standards of the industry. This measure also acts as a protection for our players against fraud.
Account deletion follows a very strict process. As such, we take into consideration the 4 following criteria before an account is deleted:
- The gaming activity of the account since its creation
- The account’s libraries: accounts that include purchased PC games are not eligible for deletion
- The duration of inactivity of the account, meaning the last login to our ecosystem (including from Ubisoft games on Steam and other platforms)
- In practice, as of today, we have never deleted accounts that have been inactive for less than 4 years
- The existence of an active subscription tied to the account.
In any case, before the deletion is permanent, three emails are sent to the player over a 30-day period offering to restore their account. In addition, if the user tries to log in during the 30-day window, they will automatically receive a warning and a link to reactivate their account.”
As it usually happens in such cases, custom support did not provide the full picture. Going by Ubisoft's official clarification, no user is at risk of losing purchased games even after long periods of inactivity. Our digital libraries are safe once again, at least for the time being.
About the author: Francesco De Meo has been covering video games and technology since 2012, starting his career at small outlets like Gamersyndrome and GeekSnack. After joining Wccftech gaming section in 2015, he quickly expanded his video gaming coverage with in-depth reporting, interviews with iconic industry figures such as Grasshopper Manufacture founder and No More Heroes creator Goichi "Suda51" Suda, Resident Evil series creator Shinji Mikami, Team NINJA's president and Nioh series director Fumihiko Yasuda, and Silent Hill creator Keiichiro Toyama, reviews and on-the-ground coverage of major industry events such as Gamescom and E3. When he's not reporting or reviewing, Francesco can be found playing the genres he loves most, spending time with his six cats, reading, writing music, playing guitar and drumming for his progressive rock band.
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