Those are good questions.
It seems to me that destroying data means magnetizing it, making it go away so that it's no longer held at all.
I am very skeptical about the ability to anonymize data, and I think the loophole it creates is this space for de-identified or anonymized data, which can be so easily re-identified, with so few factors taken into account. It goes back to the notion of retention as well.
The intention always was, “Tell me why you want it. I'll say yes. Once you're done, make it go away.” Yet, because of the monetary value of all this information, we're just letting companies hold it in perpetuity.
I think it is a loophole. It's another loophole that allows them to hold it because it might be valuable in the future.