User Data Intents
Control how your data is used across the ATProtocol network
Overview
User Data Intents is an experimental feature that allows you to declare how you want your data to be used across the decentralized ATProtocol network. This feature is based on the User Intents Proposal for the ATProtocol ecosystem.
By setting these preferences, you can indicate whether you allow or disallow various uses of your public data by compliant services across the network. These declarations are stored as ATProtocol records in your personal data server (PDS) and can be read by any compatible service.
How to Set Your Preferences
You can manage your user data intents through the dashboard settings page:
- Log in to your account
- Navigate to Dashboard Settings
- Scroll down to the Experimental Features section
- Find the User Data Intents form
- Set your preferences for each category
- Click Save User Intents
Your preferences will be saved as two separate records in your PDS:
- General Intent ("self"): Applies to all services across the ATProtocol network
- Service-Specific Intent ("did:web:atwork.place"): Applies specifically to at://work and related services
The service-specific intent takes precedence over the general intent when both are set.
Available Preferences
Archiving / Preservation
Control: Whether you allow public access to or replay of your account data as part of archiving and preservation efforts.
What this means: When set to "Disallow", services should not include your data in
public archives or preservation projects. For example, at://work will add a
<meta name="robots" content="noarchive"> tag to your profile and job listing
pages, instructing search engines and web crawlers not to cache these pages.
- Allow: Your data may be included in archival efforts
- Disallow: Your data should not be archived publicly
- No Preference: You have not expressed a preference (default)
Protocol Bridging
Control: Whether you allow bridging of your account data or interactions into distinct social web protocol ecosystems.
What this means: Some services may bridge content between different social protocols (e.g., cross-posting to ActivityPub/Mastodon, Nostr, etc.). This setting indicates your preference for such bridges.
- Allow: Your data may be bridged to other protocols
- Disallow: Your data should remain within the ATProtocol ecosystem
- No Preference: You have not expressed a preference (default)
Bulk Datasets
Control: Whether you allow your data to be included in bulk "snapshot" datasets which are publicly redistributed, even if only for a fixed time period.
What this means: Some services create downloadable datasets of public data for research, analytics, or other purposes. This setting controls whether your data should be included in such datasets.
- Allow: Your data may be included in bulk datasets
- Disallow: Your data should be excluded from bulk datasets
- No Preference: You have not expressed a preference (default)
Technical Details
Your user intents are stored as ATProtocol records in your PDS using the
org.user-intents.demo.declaration lexicon. These records can be read by any service
that accesses your public data.
Example AT-URIs for your intent records:
at://your.did/org.user-intents.demo.declaration/self- Your general intentat://your.did/org.user-intents.demo.declaration/did:web:atwork.place- Your intent specific to at://work
Privacy and Enforcement
Important: User Data Intents are declarations of your preferences, not technical restrictions. They work similarly to robots.txt files on the web - they communicate your wishes to services, but rely on those services to respect them.
Well-behaved services in the ATProtocol ecosystem should:
- Read and parse user intent declarations
- Respect "Disallow" settings when processing user data
- Apply service-specific intents when available
- Fall back to general intents when service-specific ones are not set
However, there is no technical mechanism that prevents a service from ignoring these preferences. If privacy is critical for certain data, do not post it publicly.
Questions and Feedback
As an experimental feature, we welcome your feedback on User Data Intents. If you have questions or suggestions, please share them with the broader ATProtocol community through the proposal discussion.
Related Resources
- Dashboard Settings - Set your user intents preferences
- User Profiles Guide - Learn about profile features
- ATProtocol Integration - Understand how we use ATProtocol
- User Intents Proposal - Read the full proposal