LOAD DATA is considered unsafe for statement-based logging (see Section 17.2.1.3, “Determination of Safe and Unsafe Statements in Binary Logging”). When binlog_format=MIXED is set, the statement is logged in row-based format. When binlog_format=STATEMENT is set, note that LOAD DATA does not generate a warning, unlike other unsafe statements.

If you use LOAD DATA with binlog_format=STATEMENT, each replica on which the changes are to be applied creates a temporary file containing the data. The replica then uses a LOAD DATA statement to apply the changes. This temporary file is not encrypted, even if binary log encryption is active on the source, If encryption is required, use row-based or mixed binary logging format instead, for which replicas do not create the temporary file.

If a PRIVILEGE_CHECKS_USER account has been used to help secure the replication channel (see Section 17.3.3, “Replication Privilege Checks”), it is strongly recommended that you log LOAD DATA operations using row-based binary logging (binlog_format=ROW). If REQUIRE_ROW_FORMAT is set for the channel, row-based binary logging is required. With this logging format, the FILE privilege is not needed to execute the event, so do not give the PRIVILEGE_CHECKS_USER account this privilege. If you need to recover from a replication error involving a LOAD DATA INFILE operation logged in statement format, and the replicated event is trusted, you could grant the FILE privilege to the PRIVILEGE_CHECKS_USER account temporarily, removing it after the replicated event has been applied.

When mysqlbinlog reads log events for LOAD DATA statements logged in statement-based format, a generated local file is created in a temporary directory. These temporary files are not automatically removed by mysqlbinlog or any other MySQL program. If you do use LOAD DATA statements with statement-based binary logging, you should delete the temporary files yourself after you no longer need the statement log. For more information, see Section 4.6.9, “mysqlbinlog — Utility for Processing Binary Log Files”.