New government regulations mandate archiving

For years, the term "archival" was used to describe data that was in its long-term, decreasing value stage, and was most often stored on optical discs. As customers and vendors identify their more pressing storage needs going forward, the amount of data in the category of archival and long-term retention is being viewed differently than before. Historically, when data reached archival status, it had reached its final state before being deleted and ending the data life-cycle. Archiving almost always assumed that the value of data decreased as it aged. This is no longer the case, as the value of data is often increasing as it ages due to a variety of factors including new government regulations. The concept of managing data throughout its life-cycle has taken on renewed emphasis throughout the storage industry and, at times, it seems like all data has become critical. The second-wave of archival storage management is underway.

Archival Data and Fixed Content

Archival and fixed content applications are now growing significantly faster than traditional storage applications. Fixed content includes storage-intensive applications such as critical business applications data, complex legal and reference documents, medical data, e-mail attachments, blueprints, satellite imagery, security surveillance, check images, and broadcast content-among others whose content is seldom, if ever, altered. In addition, over half of the digital data being generated annually today (this is approximately one exabyte or 1x1018) now falls into the category of archival and fixed content, meaning that the data doesn't change after it is initially created. Businesses are deleting data at a slower rate than ever before due to new legal requirements and government regulations. When archival and fixed content data ages beyond its active or re-reference period, the data is still required to be retained and Network Attached automated optical library storage remains the optimal choice and lowest overall cost solution for long-term archival storage. This is expected to remain the case for the foreseeable future and represents the largest new growth market for optical storage. The longer requirements for digital data retention has triggered much of the current Data Life Cycle Management activity and directly affects the optical storage industry, the primary repository for the vast majority of this data.

Regulatory Issues Arrive

Increasing regulatory pressure to comply with federal mandates for e-mail, medical, and insurance, legal, financial and government classified data are quickly forcing many businesses to examine any potential weak points in their long-term storage systems. New applications and a variety of legal and business requirements are driving the need for many businesses to re-examine or create their archival policies. One of the most visible examples of the emphasis on the increasingly critical value of archival data lies with the HIPPA (Health Insurance Portability and Accounting Act) requirements. Not only does HIPPA require health providers to preserve data for a yet to be determined time period, but the failure to protect critical patient data presently carries with it penalties ranging up to or exceeding $25,000 per violation. Just the threat of the fines and other forms of non-compliance are encouraging storage administrators to make sure that an increasing amount of archival data will be kept indefinitely for future reference. The PACS (Picture Archiving and Communications System) application that captures and stores radiology information and other types of medical images is a primary component of the HIPPA requirement. Data used to be retained for one year, and then three years, and then seven years: now infinite retention seems inevitable for some applications. Given today's legal, economic and political climate, the value of archival data has never been higher. Following is a partial list of regulations, which are becoming increasingly important to the storage administrator's strategy: * The Sarbanes-Oxley Act defines rules for falsification of records and e-mail with retention and deletion guidelines. * HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) for medical images and records. * Brokerage Business: SEC Rule 17a-3 and 17a-4 * Banking & Finance: BASEL II, Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act and FDIC regulations * Bio-Tech & Pharmaceutical - CFR21 Title 11 * Numerous other regulations under review