Entries from January 2008 ↓

While skimming through Wikipedia looking for a bit more info on Conway polyhedron notation (not as interesting as it sounds), I came across an article on molecular memory. Apparently nanotech, the future savior of humanity (according to an influential member of the nanotech community), is taking a break from making my pants stain-proof to bring us a super-speedy new type of memory. It probably goes without saying since we are talking nanotech, but this is also, potentially, a pretty compact memory option.

Now my nano-physics education stopped right after second grade, so I don’t really understand a great deal about the details of this idea. Apparently, the goal is to store bits of data on molecules only a few nanometers wide. Eventually, the hope is to have a byte per molecule, but for now it is more likely that a group of molecules would contain each byte. There were also some things about photochromism and capacitance which make for an interesting read, but are a dull in the retelling (especially from a blogger who’s topic already ranks pretty high on the bored o’ meter). Suffice it to say, should they pull this off we would be looking at memory that makes flash drives look like my 80 year old grandmother in an Olympic sprint event.

Most of the research going into this is attempting to create a replacement for RAM. This, of course, isn’t exactly our area of interest in the backup world. We tend to be more concerned with non-volatile memory (memory that doesn’t forget when turned off). But, don’t worry. A quick Google search for ” non-volatile molecular memories” brings up quite a few results, some with promising names like Harvard in their URLs.

This may not be the very next step in data storage, but its probably not that far off. With the demands for space growing as rapidly as they are and the concerns of storage capacity, speed and environmental impact growing with them, we should expect plenty of innovative thought in the area.  I, for one, will be waiting anxiously to ask a molecule for my missing files.

Alright, I admit it. This blog’s fascination with disaster is beginning to seem a bit obsessive. I apologize, but there is just so much of it. Its hard to resist.

Today’s story, from the AP,  is the tale of Charter Communication and the accidental erasure of the contents of 14,000 email accounts. That’s right . . . 14,000 accounts. The event, which was apparently a simple mistake in routine maintenance, erased every email, every attachment . . . everything. In 14,000 accounts.

Ouch.

It gets worse. According to a spokeswoman for the company, there is no way to retrieve any of the information that was inadvertently deleted. This enormous communication company, with accounts across the country, does not have a backup policy to protect its users from itself.

The company claims it is taking steps to assure that this never happens again. I would suggest a less optimistic approach wherein they take steps to make sure that when it does happen again (which it will in some form) they can retrieve the lost data.

I feel badly for those who lost important data in this event.  No doubt countless, irreplaceable communications boiled into the ether. I urge everyone using a free email account to take a lesson from this and find a way to save and archive those emails. This sort of accident occurs regularly. While the scale of this particular incident makes it a rarity, the events themselves are not uncommon.

I will do a little research on the topic, so look for some tips on how to backup your free email account in the near future.

I will tread somewhat lightly on this disaster to avoid a political debate in which this particular blog has no interest. If you want political debates you’ll have to meet me for a beer. That said, I have seen the White House in the news attached to backup so often that I couldn’t continue to completely ignore it.

Basically, there are a large number of emails missing from the backup records that the White House keeps, and the explanation for the missing tapes has been somewhat suspect. Robert K. Blechman gives us a good rundown of the questionable claims in his blog post, so I won’t go into it any further than I have. Give it a read and draw your own conclusions.

That said, this story is a good reminder of the importance of carefully documented backup procedures. Most of the White House’s issue seems to be based on confusion, real or feigned, over the agreed upon backup methodology. It is vital for companies, and government organizations, to have a backup plan that is clear and easily followed.

The issue of tapes also comes into play in this story, but that is something we will get into later. For now, lets try to imagine an appropriate backup plan for White House email records and a way in which that plan could be presented without leaving such room for error.

Ask the Admin, a newly discovered (and newly subscribed to) blog, presented us with a pleasantly absurd new backup idea . . . paper. Yes, that’s right, cellulose pulp, the descendant of papyrus. Apparently, a new piece of software called PaperBack (obviously) will allow you to back up your data to that most basic of mediums.

I know, some of you are saying you already have a device for this purpose. You call it a printer. There is even a specialized storage unit for all that backup material, referred to, I believe, as a file cabinet. But wait. This is different.

PaperBack, instead of rolling out sheet after sheet of tedious words and spreadsheets, will print a bitmap image of your data that can be restored using an ordinary scanner. Sure, its ridiculous, but still, you have to admit, it is also just a little bit cool.

Would I use it as part of a backup strategy? No. Would I recommend you use it? Not unless I had something against you. But, I will try it out because it sounds entertaining. Just don’t tell my green friends about it . . . there is definitely a danger to trees in this backup solution. Though, it may be some consultation if I recycled my unneeded backups into delicate origami swans.

So, on a whim I decided to carve out a little space for Howie over on Squidoo. Basically the site allows you to create a “lens” or single page website about any topic. Depending on how we end up feeling about this particular page we may put up a few more on important backup related topics and maybe one or two on less serious issues.

Head over via the link above and let us know what you think.

Link to Howie’s lens was updated. Make sure your are visiting www.squidoo.com/howie-hard-drive.

In addition to bringing you updates on technology, advice on backup best practices and occasional misguided musings, this blog will also follow the world’s data debacles. Like drivers slowing down as they pass the scene of an accident, we will, at times, be guilty of gaping, gawking and staring at the smoking remains of a data disaster. These stories are not shared to mock the victims or to take comfort in their misfortune because it is not ours. Rather, we examine these disasters in order to understand our own vulnerabilities and the importance of data safety. If they are somewhat amusing every once in a while, that is simply a bonus. Not really the case with todays entry though.

Today the AP reported that the credit card numbers of 650,000 people have been “misplaced”. These credit cards are handled by GE Money for JC Penney and other major retailers. Among those 650k are 150,000 that have social security numbers attached, putting them at a greater risk for identity theft.

The data in question was stored on a backup tape at a data storage warehouse run by Iron Mountain, and was discovered missing in October. There are apparently no signs of theft but the tape is definitely not where it is supposed to be.

Sensitive data is a valuable commodity, tempting for thieves and difficult to secure. GE Money is providing credit monitoring for those effected and has been performing a major notification campaign. This campaign might, according to the AP article, be flawed due to the fact that the letter comes in a GE Money envelope and is likely discarded as junk by many of the recipients. Hopefully this loss won’t have any painful ramifications for the individuals involved, but if it does the notification process might find itself the subject of unpleasant scrutiny.

Data loss happens. Tapes disappear. Hard drives fail. The only thing one can do is be prepared and have a disaster recovery plan for every contingency. The notification of those affected is an important part of this plan as, of course, is a backup of that important data.

Note: JC Penney is not in any way at fault for the loss of data. The other retailers affected remain undisclosed.

I have had an interest in RFID ever since I designed a logo for a company using the technology in combination with electronic paper. There are some patent issues and non-disclosure agreements surrounding that, so I can’t say much more. I can, however, point you to this cool new product from Stysen.

I don’t currently have much need for this sort of technology myself, but for those with heavy travel schedules and sensitive information this could be an excellent addition to the laptop bag.

Thanks to Dustbowl for the heads up.

In an apparent effort to help me make yesterday’s point about the importance of on-site backup, Data Center Knowledge reports that two of Joyent’s online backup centers have been down for the last three days . If one of these is your only backup location than you are without access to your data for at least three days. Cross your fingers, knock on a hard drive (lightly) and hope you don’t need it.
As I said before, these things happen. Joyent got hit by a major bug. They have been upfront about the issue and are apparently making every effort to correct it. While such occurrences may be relatively rare, it is your responsibility to prepare for contingencies. The best way to do this is through a multi-site backup plan including an on-site location.

If you have a story of downtime at your online or off-site storage center let me know in the comments.

You can’t go anywhere these days without hearing about off-site backup, remote backup and online backup. Ok, that’s not actually true. You can probably make it through a movie, a trip to the grocery store or a game of bowling without hearing about it. In fact, you can probably go pretty much anywhere without listening to anything about data safety, but, that said, these are still pretty prevalent topics among the IT community. Nearly every mention of data backup includes something about getting your vital information off-site and most of it lately seems focused on it.

The buzz around off-site backup is deserved. Moving data to a location far from your main computer system prevents it from burning in the same fire, getting wet in the same flood or getting picked up, torn to pieces and deposited somewhere over the rainbow by the same tornado. Remote backup is a key element of any disaster recovery scheme, but it is not the only important part of a backup plan.

What tends to get overlooked in all this off-site excitement is the importance of on-site backup. “On-site,” you say, “How quaint. How gauche. How 90’s.” With all this ability to compress, dedupe and ship off, why would anyone want something as archaic as a hard drive on their desk or an extra rack in the server room? Why, when I can send my backup to Kansas, would I want it sitting at my elbow?

In the tradition of blogs everywhere, I will answer those questions in the form of a numbered list. Here are five reasons to have and maintain an on-site backup:

1. Cost
Hard drive space is cheap and getting cheaper. Space which used to cost a small fortune can now be had for the price of Gigli DVD (which do you think is the better value?), and previously unattainable storage in the Terabyte plus realm can cost as little as $350. Data center space on the other hand, while cheap for the first few gigs, can quickly spiral toward a high monthly cost. Keeping an on-site copy of all data allows you to manage the amount archived off-site and keep those per-gig prices down.

2. Bandwidth
Depending on the amount of data that needs to be shipped off-site, the state of bandwidth, particularly for smaller organizations can be a significant concern. The time it takes to ship data off-site is directly related to the amount of bandwidth on both ends of the send equation. Companies with growing backup needs, particularly those relying strictly on online backup, may need to invest pretty heavily in bandwidth upgrades. Backing up on-site can lessen the strain on bandwidth and keep you out of trouble with your ISP’s creditors.

3. File Structure
Online backup requires the compression of backup files prior to sending. This amounts to squeezing all of your data into one little box and sending it off to storage. Normally that data is neatly organized, like items in a closet, onto shelves and hangers. If you need a file, prior to backup, you simply go to the shelf where it belongs and retrieve it. However, due to the compression and deduping that often takes place in online backup, finding a file is more like pulling a box out of the attic, unpacking the whole thing onto the shelves and then retrieving the file you need. Not only is it time consuming, but there is some room for error in the process. On-site backup, combined with the affordability of storage space allows you to maintain the structure of your files (presuming your software allows this). So, finding a file is as easy as going to another similar closet and picking it off the shelf. Single file recovery is much easier from an on-site backup location.

4. Recovery
The vast majority, over 90%, of recoveries made from backup are not due to a disaster. Your off-site copy is a backup fail-safe. It is the net below the tightrope. It should only be relied on in the event of a major catastrophe. Most of the time recovery can be made more quickly and easily from an on-site drive location. The main reason for this is download speed. At best most offices will have a T1 Internet connection which allows for the download of 1.5MB per second (on average). This means that recovering a single gigabyte of data will take, in a perfect world, about an hour and a half. However, this is not a perfect world. If it were I would be receiving a massage as I wrote this and all the worlds bombs would turn into delicious ice-cream sundaes. In reality, you will actually be more likely to spend 2 to 4 hours per gig. Can you afford to be without your 5 GB sales database for twenty hours just because a blundering sales person turned the thing inside out through some, still-mysterious process only blundering sales people seem to be able to duplicate? Probably not. So you had better have an on-site copy which will provide you access in minutes.

5. Security
Most off-site storage companies are legitimate, stable businesses. Most online backup companies will take very good care of your data. This is not intended to disparage off-site, remote storage solutions. However, things happen. Companies go out of business and if superonlinebackupforyou.com goes out of business, what happens to your data? What if, despite the array of protections your third-party storage location has in place, a disaster occurs for which they were unprepared . . . a flood in Arizona, a hurricane in Michigan or a prehistoric monster attack in . . . well anywhere? How will you recover? An on-site copy protects against contingencies out there just as an off-site copy protects against disasters at home. A good backup solution makes use of both.

Off-site backup is important, whether you do it online, site-to-site, or though some other transport method. It does not, however, eliminate the need for on-site data storage. The best practice in backup is multi-site, using on-site and off-site storage to protect your critical data.

Can you think of any other benefits of having a copy on-site? What other multi-site strategies do you incorporate in your backup plan?

We’ve all heard of, and understand the importance of, off-site backup, but what about offshore? According to an article on Data Center Knowledge, off-shore could be the new off-site for those willing to brave the high seas. Apparently, a nautically fixated company, known as IDS (International Data Security), is planning to build data centers on de-commissioned cargo ships.

Concerns in the comments of the post reflect the sort of things you may imagine, particularly hurricanes, tsunamis and other potential oceanic disasters. However, the company literature claims that being afloat is actual protection against natural catastrophes. While I’m not sure I buy that (disaster-proof on the gulf coast?), I’m intrigued enough to want more info.

There are a couple of interesting “green” components to the plans to please those of us concerned about the impending global meltdown to which data storage is contributing to on an increasingly high level. Backup is still nowhere close to cow flatulence in terms of greenhouse gas emissions, but it is an increasing worry. The cargo ship data center claims a significant decrease in cooling costs due to being waist deep in sea water as well as an intention to make use of bio fuel and recycled drive heat.

Port security and weather concerns are definitely going to cause some hesitation when deciding to get on board with this project (I know, terrible pun), but it is an exciting way to recycle space. I will definitely be keeping an eye on IDS.