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The following is a minor variant of the function uniqueTuples as given by Simon Woods in this answer.

g[lists___List] := Module[{f}, f[___, x_, x_,___] := Sequence[]; f[x___] := (f[x]=Sequence[];{x}); Attributes[f]={Orderless}; Flatten[Outer[f, lists], Length[{lists}]-1]] data=RandomInteger[40, {6,11}]; Length[g @@ data] // Timing (* {6.177640,388897} *)

In the definition of g we have a local variable f, which is used as a function and for which a lot of DownValues could be created. This function is not removed when the Module is evaluated:

Names["f$*"] (* {f$,f$342} *) Length[DownValues[f$342]] (* 388899 *)

I am using version 10.0.2 on Windows (32-bit). Indeed, this bug made Mathematica crash due to lack of memory when I used this function a number of times with larger arguments.

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g[lists___List] := Module[{f}, f[___, x_, x_, ___] := Sequence[]; f[x___] := (f[x] = Sequence[]; {x}); Attributes[f] = {Orderless, Temporary}; Flatten[Outer[f, lists], Length[{lists}] - 1]]

To address the comments let me put it another way: If you overwrite the attributes of course they are going to be 'lost'

Look at this:

g[lists___List] := Module[{f}, f[___, x_, x_, ___] := Sequence[]; f[x___] := (f[x] = Sequence[]; {x}); Print[Attributes[f]]; Attributes[f] = {Orderless}; Print[Attributes[f]]; Flatten[Outer[f, lists], Length[{lists}] - 1]]
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    $\begingroup$ Thank you very much. This is a nice and useful workaround, but adding the attribute Temporary to a local variable of a Module should be superfluous. $\endgroup$ Commented Jan 20, 2015 at 10:21
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    $\begingroup$ Ah, I see. It is not a bug in Mathematica, but a subtle error of mine. The solution is to use SetAttributes[f, Orderless]; instead of defining Attributes[f]={Orderless};. Many thanks again. $\endgroup$ Commented Jan 20, 2015 at 12:13

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