# Userkeys in Issue Entity Properties

**URL:** <https://community.developer.atlassian.com/t/userkeys-in-issue-entity-properties/25391>\
**Category:** Jira Cloud\
**Tags:** gdpr\
**Created:** [December 6, 2018, 3:56pm UTC](https://community.developer.atlassian.com/t/userkeys-in-issue-entity-properties/25391 "2018-12-06T15:56:03Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![jbevan](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/atlassiandeveloper/user_avatar/community.developer.atlassian.com/jbevan/32/44430_2.png) [@jbevan](https://community.developer.atlassian.com/u/jbevan)\
**Post date:** [December 6, 2018, 3:56pm UTC](https://community.developer.atlassian.com/t/userkeys-in-issue-entity-properties/25391/1 "2018-12-06T15:56:03Z")

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In our app descriptor we specify a few custom issue entity properties that store user keys as strings. We make those entity properties available for use in the JQL queries through issue property aliases. There isn’t a way to tell Jira that the string is a user reference.

See the docs here [Property Index](https://developer.atlassian.com/cloud/jira/platform/modules/property-index/)

To meet GDPR requirements, we need to update the value we store to be the accountId. During the migration period we can store both the userkey and the accountId because arrays are supported in entity properties.

When Atlassian updates everyone’s JQL Functions that they have saved as Filters in Jira Cloud to use accountIds instead of userkeys, are they only going to replace userkeys in clauses in the JQL that Atlassian know are referencing a user field?  
Or, is it more of a naive Find and Replace effort, where any string that is a valid userkey will be replaced by the matching accountId, regardless of where in the JQL query that userkey exists (e.g. if I’m storing userkeys inside a text custom field or the description of the issue instead of inside a _user_ custom field).

The reason I ask is because we have no way of telling Atlassian that we want them to replace JQL clauses that reference our issue entity aliases with the accountId and they have no way of knowing that the text we store is a userkey…

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**Author:** ![rwhitbeck](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/atlassiandeveloper/user_avatar/community.developer.atlassian.com/rwhitbeck/32/35781_2.png) [@rwhitbeck](https://community.developer.atlassian.com/u/rwhitbeck)\
**Post date:** [December 7, 2018, 4:01am UTC](https://community.developer.atlassian.com/t/userkeys-in-issue-entity-properties/25391/2 "2018-12-07T04:01:11Z")

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Thanks @jbevan, this came up at App Week last month and the team is already aware of the issue and told me today they are currently seeking a solution to the problem. Unfortunately, at the moment I don’t have a Jira ticket to point you to.

I’ll keep looking and update here where you can watch this issue.

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**Author:** ![jbevan](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/atlassiandeveloper/user_avatar/community.developer.atlassian.com/jbevan/32/44430_2.png) [@jbevan](https://community.developer.atlassian.com/u/jbevan)\
**Post date:** [January 15, 2019, 3:29pm UTC](https://community.developer.atlassian.com/t/userkeys-in-issue-entity-properties/25391/3 "2019-01-15T15:29:17Z")

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Hi @rwhitbeck, any chance someone hit on a solution to this over the Christmas/New Year break?

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**Author:** ![akassab](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/atlassiandeveloper/user_avatar/community.developer.atlassian.com/akassab/32/40412_2.png) [@akassab](https://community.developer.atlassian.com/u/akassab)\
**Post date:** [February 19, 2019, 5:23pm UTC](https://community.developer.atlassian.com/t/userkeys-in-issue-entity-properties/25391/4 "2019-02-19T17:23:03Z")

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Just cross posting [the response](https://community.developer.atlassian.com/t/weekly-gdpr-api-status-development-update-february-13th/26978/8) from our latest weekly status post in case others are watching this topic.