Have you ever thought about data on your computer? It doesn’t matter whether you are a content creator, programmer, or just a regular user thousands of different files were created, downloaded, and altered on your device. But what happens when some of that data becomes useless to you?

Usually, this data will be manually deleted to get some free space on your storage device or it will be wiped during the OS reinstallation. Everything that happened with that data starting from its creation or collection until its destruction is called the data life cycle.

The data life cycle is a sequence of stages that happened to a particular unit of data. The simplified life cycle model has 5 basic stages: Collection, Processing, Retention, Disclosure, Destruction. In practice, when we talk about personal data life cycle, this sequence can be dramatically different, dependant on the type of information, its usage, origin, company policies, personal data protection regulations and legislation.

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