I want to delete user from jira

[Soleha Sayyed/MSE/Technology]

I want to delete a user from jira but it is showing below mentioned error

Cannot deactivate user because they are currently the project lead on these projects: DPI, EBD, EK, MWM, MWH, PA, RP, RPB, RPD, VOB, WHR.

I tried to deactivate him but it is showing same error as mentioned above.Kindly revert as soon as possible.

[Joe Pitt]

Do not delete users

Users should be made inactive not deleted. JIRA uses a pointer to the user’s DB entry to display user information. If you delete a user when you open a JIRA issue the user worked on anywhere the user that would be displayed will cause a SQL error. Even if the user never logged on or were assigned a ticket the history of the ticket will get an error when you display it.

You need to remove them from the their roles first

[Jack Brickey]

Agree. It is so much easer to deactivate a user than trying to decouple them from all the projects and issues.

[leandropbarreto]

I agree with @Joe Pitt 

The best way to deal with inactive Users is to deactivate them so you can seek this information later. 

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

I agree too, with all three comments above. 

The reason Jira is refusing to delete them is that they are associated with data that matters.  If you absolutely must delete a user instead of just deactivating them, then you must move their responsibilities first.

[Maltavius]

According to GDPR we can't save personal information indefinitely so this doesn't fly.

We need to be able to delete users.

In Confluence the username is printed like Unknown user  (assba)

Which tells us more than enough on who the person was without anything else.

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

No.  You have not understood GDPR rules.

You can save the information, until it has no use to you.  As you always need to be able to audit things, you can keep it as per your compliance and auditing regulations.

Once it falls out of the legally auditable time, then you can anonymise it (in some cases, you can anonymise it earlier)

[Mårten Woxberg]

@Nic Brough -Adaptavist-They aren't associated to data that matters any more, they are associated to closed projects that has no need to be associated to this person that doesn't and has not worked here in years.

We still might want to look at the project but who leads it is an entirely moot point.

The fact that I need to manually go in an change the project lead to a dummy account and then go into all the components and change those as well...

Anonymizing doesn't work when the users are read in through LDAP.

[Krister Broman _Advania_]

As long as you have issues or projects associated with a user you will not be able to delete that user. Best practice is to not delete the user but to set that user as inactive, this means that you retain the data and will not utilize a license for that inactive user.