Universal Consent Lifecycle & Compliance

Universal Consent helps you keep a user's consent choices consistent across the experiences where you recognize them. This guide explains how those preferences are stored, shared, honored, and deleted.

For an introduction to Universal Consent and available deployment options, see the Overview. For implementation details, see the Developer Guide.

Protecting Identifiers

Universal Consent does not use a plain-text email address or account name as the key for a consent record.

Instead, the identifier you provide is converted into a hash before it is stored. You can think of a hash as a fingerprint that allows Universal Consent to recognize the same user without storing the original identifier as the record key.

The hash is also scoped to your DataGrail customer and project, helping prevent consent records from being associated across different customers or projects.

Pseudonymization, not anonymization. Hashed identifiers are considered pseudonymized rather than anonymous data and may still be treated as personal data under applicable privacy laws.

Choosing an Identifier

When possible, we recommend using a stable, non-PII identifier, such as a UUID or internal user ID, rather than an email address or phone number. This provides an additional layer of privacy while still allowing Universal Consent to recognize the same user across supported experiences.

What's Stored

Universal Consent stores the user's consent preferences against their hashed identifier. For example:

• Marketing: Off
• Analytics: On
• Functional: On

The consent record does not contain the user's activity or their plain-text identity.

This gives your team a consistent consent record while helping ensure that changes, including withdrawals of consent, are reflected across connected experiences.

The Data Lifecycle

Every consent choice moves through a predictable lifecycle.

• Support consent accountability. Because every change is timestamped, you can demonstrate when and what a user consented to — a core requirement for accountability under the GDPR.
• Consistent preference handling. Once a choice is recorded, connected surfaces can reference the same consent record, helping ensure withdrawals and updates are honored consistently.

Consent Accountability

Universal Consent maintains timestamps when consent preferences change, giving your team a record of what preference was captured and when.

This can help support compliance and audit needs, including demonstrating consent history where required.

Because connected experiences reference the same consent record, a user's updated preference does not need to remain isolated to the browser or device where they made the change.

Deleting a Record

If a user submits a valid deletion request, such as a GDPR right-to-erasure request or an equivalent request under another applicable privacy law, their Universal Consent record can be deleted as part of your DataGrail request workflow.

Deletion is initiated through DataGrail rather than through a public-facing website or application. This helps ensure that deletion actions are authenticated and auditable.

The process follows these steps:

1. The user submits a deletion request.
2. Your privacy team processes the request in DataGrail.
3. DataGrail removes the Universal Consent record.
4. The action is recorded.

Deletion Details

• Deletion is controlled. Universal Consent records are deleted through an authenticated DataGrail workflow rather than directly through a client-side SDK.
• Deletion applies to the Universal Consent record. If the user's personal data also exists in other systems, such as analytics, marketing, or internal data platforms, those systems should be addressed separately as part of your broader request workflow.
• Deletion is auditable. The action is recorded so your team can track completion of the request.

Privacy Program Support

The table below maps common privacy requirements to how Universal Consent supports them.

Requirement	How Universal Consent Helps
Keep consent consistent for a recognized user	Maintains a central consent record that supported experiences can reference
Honor updated or withdrawn consent	Connected experiences can retrieve the user's latest preference
Maintain a record of consent	Consent changes are timestamped
Minimize use of direct identifiers	Consent records are keyed using a hashed identifier rather than a plain-text identity
Support deletion requests	Universal Consent records can be deleted through an authenticated DataGrail workflow

Universal Consent provides the consent record and infrastructure to support these workflows. Your organization remains responsible for determining which privacy requirements apply and for configuring and implementing Universal Consent in accordance with those requirements.

Related

• Universal Consent Overview — what Universal Consent is and its deployment options
• Developer Guide — the technical integration for developers
• Consent Policies — configuring regional consent behavior
• Audit Logging — exporting the consent audit trail