On 10/4/06, Hugh Smith <[log in to unmask] > wrote:
>
> Snip from Bruce White
>
> > What seems to be forgotten is what happens 10 to 20 years from now when
> > the records can't be accessed because the format or technology is no
> > longer supported.  I've read (and been involved in) horror stories
> > where this happens.  It's now someone else's problem.  Someone ends up
> > cleaning up the mess (and it's not the individual(s) who sold the
> > solution.)  Would be nice to have some standards that will pass the
> > test of time.


There is an ARMA Standard going out for public review in the coming month
that was the labor of a project managed by Nancy Kunde who ALSO was awarded
funding as an NHPRC Grant to produce the document on "Conversion and
Migration" that addresses this EXACT issue and concern.

There are also other publications out there about trustworthy electronic
records, such as Charles Dollar's excellent book, "Authentic Electronic
Records; Strategies for Long-Term Access" , and the British Standards
Institute Publication BIP0008 "Code of Practice for Legal Admissibility and
Evidential Weight of Information Stored Electronically"

A saw a perfect case in point today and probably once a week somewhere
> in the country.  Records Centers and Vaults filled with 11" and 8"
> reels as well as other obsolete media.  If you ask can they read it,
> they say "Of course not."  But you ask "Why are you keeping it?" and
> the answer is "No one will allow us to destroy the tapes."


Well, this sounds like an obvious case of selective hearing and partial
application of the guidance provided, not unique to IT Staff, but a
prevalent problem.  Sort of like the old Far Side cartoon about "What the
Owner say; What the Dog Hears"  What they were likely told was:

"We can't destroy this information because we are required by regulation to
maintain it for XX years"

And at some point, because of application of "Information Lifecycle
Management" practices being instituted by IT as a cost saving measure, they
decided to migrate the information from ACTIVE storage sources to INACTIVE
storage (near line, as they typically refer to it) because it wasn't
regularly accessed.  THEN, after further examination of usage patterns, they
decided to migrate it AGAIN, to what they refer to as ARCHIVAL storage, (or
off line, as they also refer to it) because it wasn't accessed frequently
enough to "qualify" for near line storage.

So, IT feels that that they've done "due diligence" to BOTH saving the
information AND reducing cost, I mean they haven't thrown it away, right?
Well... not exactly right... there are known and accepted practices for
managing tape libraries as well, which involve periodic tensioning and
re-tensioning of tapes to ensure the tape doesn't "sag" on the reel and
become unusable, and they may not be doing this.... and they may not have
bothered to think about the fact that when you apply a practice to move
things from one media to another and it's because you HAVE TO RETAIN it that
you MIGHT NEED ACCESS to it, part of retaining it means keeping it
accessible, and that required hardware and software. A trivial detail...


To me these are ticking time bombs.  This is a role RM should be
> involved in as SOX speaks specifically to spoliation and holding
> something you can read identifies a problem for any auditor.  I talked
> with one today, who stated that if an auditor see the records he has
> the belief that you have the technology to read it.  It is comparable
> to keeping the shredded paper documents in the vaults because you still
> want to hold onto the paper.


Well, it's SIMILAR, but not exactly COMPARABLE =)  I mean, you could hire a
bunch of offshore workers at a low labor rate to improve your bottom line to
reassemble those shredded documents and that would make it comparable to
paying a high cost US based firm to reconstruct the data on degraded tape to
provide access to information that you can't otherwise access because you
didn't do due diligence to ensure you could access it as long as you were
required to retain it, but I digress...

They are however, as Hugh accurately defined them, "ticking time bombs" in
the event of a legal action.  Ask Toshiba, whose IT department elected to
retain backup tapes for years beyond the point they had any value or served
any purpose as far as being able to reinitialize a system in the event of a
crash or other catastrophic data loss. STILL, because they existed and they
held potentially valuable information, that required them to search and
provide reams of e-mails and other information which ended up being costly,
and damaging.

If we are to convert to a media storage format as some say, then we
> must find a way to manage the retention schedule of destruction.  It is
> simply not occurring in the media side as it has on the paper side. One
> auditor described the retention schedule for email as in perpetuity.
> How can that be?  The IT side needs direction here.


The IT side needs to better interpret the direction they're given.  They
need to ask questions before deploying technologies they view as solutions
to ONE PROBLEM that create a whole new SET OF PROBLEMS.  I've been trying to
work with SNIA on the entire concept of ILM and what they view as Long-Term
Archiving, and suggesting strongly that they engage the RIM community before
deploying these "solutions".  They are concerned with the cost of managing
active information systems with ever growing volumes of data, but just a few
years ago, it was IT that was telling the user community "Storage is cheap,
and GETTING CHEAPER, so if you need to save stuff, just buy more storage",
well, I doubt anyone ever thought they would be told to "store e-mails in
perpetuity", or that the volume of e-mails sent and received in an
organization would amount to what they are today.

Yep, we have a "chasm of understanding" to cross between RIM, IT and
Management and we need to start building the bridges sooner rather than
later.

Of course, I guess my paying attention to this post was just a sign of my
level of knowledge, =) so whatever that means, I hope others may have
learned something from this.

Larry

-- 
Larry Medina
Danville, CA
RIM Professional since 1972

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