“In keeping with our company’s work to secure information and help customers access it and use it, the focus of Iron Mountain’s philanthropic investments is culture and heritage preservation,” said Samantha Joseph. “We are thrilled to lend our people, experience and technology to CyArk so they can properly secure the digital blueprints of our most important heritage sites—the family photographs of human history.”

CyArk is a fascinating organization and Iron Mountain is very proud to provide enabling technology and services to help them achieve their mission.

I had a chance to sit down with Tom at the end of the show and hear more about his story.  Here’s a transcript of some of our conversation:

Jeremy: How did you get into this world of 3D laser scanning?

Tom:  So my first exposure was in about 1999 back when I was a market research analyst. I was attending a conference in Houston, Texas that I was helping to organize and there was a company that brought one of these scanning devices. I saw the data and thought “who cares” because it looked like a black and white photograph.  And then it dawned on me later that this was 3D data and that this was something really special.

A short time later I had an epiphany and realized that industry needs this technology. Law enforcement needs this. Power companies need this. Oil companies need this. And heritage professionals need this. In 2003, my wife and I said this is going to be a coming thing and it needed a voice. So we launched a conference, newsletter and consulting business singularly focused on this market.

Jeremy: Why was building an archive of heritage sites important to CyArk?

Tom: These sites are at risk. We take them for granted. We think if they stood for 5,000 years, that they will be with us forever. Well, that just isn’t the case. Some of these sites will stay with us for 2000 years and then they are lost. It was really important to create a digital record of these sites before they disappear. That was a key driver. The other driver is that we lack the resources to save every site physically to restore it. We don’t have enough budget or enough time to save every site in a physical format. So we said “okay” let us preserve them digitally.

Jeremy: Currently, you use this data for producing iPhone/iPad apps and providing drawings so that certain sites that have been damaged can be reconstructed, what other applications are out there? What do you believe the future holds for this 3D Data?

Tom: The first thing I see is our ability to capture the information is going to increase. We are not done with that journey. It is going to get faster, it is going to become less expensive, it is going to become more accurate. We are just at the beginning of this journey. More data is on its way. That is one piece.

I think our ability to disseminate that info in creative ways will also change. We talk around the office about the holodeck. How do we create that virtual experience of being there without actually physically being there?

Jeremy: You are referring to Star Trek—where they had technology that transported characters to a faraway land?

Tom: Exactly. Are we at the holodeck stage? No. We are at a very early stage. We see that off in the far away horizon. But the ability to combine different data sets and present them in a creative way– is increasing. We see a lot of progress in that area.

We’re collecting more data and so we’re going to need to disseminate it more creatively. That comes together at the archive, a repository where we know this data is safe and available to us.

Jeremy: What was your favorite site to work on?

Tom: You know, Jeremy, to ask that is a little like asking me ‘do you love your daughter more than you love your sons?”  I love all of my children. I would be very hard-pressed to pick just one particular site.

Jeremy: Is there any one memory that sticks out in your mind? Is there something that you think is a significant milestone in all the work you’ve done so far?

Tom: There are a couple of sites where we’ve managed to help with the reconstruction: one took place in Seoul and the other in Uganda. For the Sungnyemun Gate in Seoul, 3D laser scanner data was used in the restoration. That was particularly gratifying.

Another example is in Uganda:  The Royal Tombs at Kasubi that had been torched about 6 months after our partner, SkyBucket, had completed scanning it. So that was gratifying that we were able to bring something back–that the data is actually useful for reconstruction. It is not only that we got a snapshot that we’ve been able to actually assist with the reconstruction. That is extremely gratifying.

Some of the sites are better to experience virtually than physically. I’m thinking of some rock art sites. These sites won’t stand up to hordes of tourists visiting them –they will be destroyed. So if we can create—and we have created— digital representation of the sites then these sites can be enjoyed by all of humanity. And you know what? It doesn’t matter how many times someone downloads the information from our site, the site is still undisturbed by all of the downloads. That’s the beauty of digital preservation of historic sites.  

Jeremy, let me take this opportunity to thank the Iron Mountain team for all the help in delivering the archive infrastructure.  It is wonderful for us to work with your organization knowing that we share the vision of the importance of heritage to the generations who follow us.

Jeremy: Thank you, Tom. We’re thrilled to offer CyArk our support in heritage preservation. Thank you for joining me at Computerworld’s SNW event to share your story with others.

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1. When you need to retrieve archived data in minutes

Often, you have tremendous amounts of sensitive data that you can’t and shouldn’t store on active disk, so it’s archived. But if you haven’t thought about your access requirements, you could stall data retrieval and face serious consequences. Consider this. Healthcare institutions create massive volumes of image-based data daily – from X-rays to MRIs. Doctors may never need to refer to this data again – but when they do, near-instant access can make a world of difference in patient care. Storing and retrieving patient information via an offsite cloud-based archive addresses this issue, speeding data access and equipping doctors with the critical information they need.

2. When you have a dynamic data environment with short recovery times

In fact, whenever you need quick access to archive and backup data, or when you want to enable more frequent backups, cloud technology provides an excellent solution. To identify the data that meets this criteria, look for data that is constantly changing and requires short RPOs and RTOs. When applied against these requirements, cloud shines compared to tape, which requires more time to backup and recover data. Cloud can position you to better meet service-level agreements (SLAs), as well.

3. When you’re going for maximum automation

Cloud-based solutions also offer the advantage of increased automation, eliminating the physical handling of backup media. If you’re managing a small- to mid-sized IT shop, this helps free up limited resources while supporting continuous information protection.

These three scenarios reflect the importance of mapping both your business requirements and data SLAs to the right data protection technologies.

To learn more about the strategic use of cloud and tape, download Tried And True Meets Shiny And New: Making Strategic Use of Tape and Cloud Technologies for Offsite Data Protection.

Who better to help you stay focused than Sgt. Joe Friday from that TV and film classic, “Dragnet?” A cop with a penchant for unearthing every detail, Friday is remembered for his no-nonsense “Just, the facts, M’am” mentality. And with some touting the demise of tape-based storage, taking a fact-based approach is just what this situation calls for.

So what are the facts? With this post, I will look at tape: how does the use of tape as an offsite backup medium truly compare to other methods?

Fact 1: Tape offers a considerably lower cost of ownership.

The TCO of tape solutions is 2-5 times less than a virtual tape library (VTL) with deduplication backup [i].  And LTO-5 tape costs up to 15 times less than SATA devices for long-term archiving. [ii]

Fact 2: Tape is an inherently more reliable medium.

Individual tape media cartridges are 2-4 orders of magnitude more reliable than SATA disk drives [iii].  What’s more, a NERSC study of automated tape systems puts their reliability at an impressive 99.999%. [iv] 

Fact 3: Tape provides the greatest capacity for data storage.

The largest disk drives store 4 TB versus 5 TB for the largest tape stores, which handle 10 TB compressed. [v]

Those are the facts – fair and square. But what do they really mean to your organization? Well, if you’re like most companies, you’re collecting and storing more data than ever before to support ongoing operational requirements, including regulatory compliance.

By using tape for offsite storage, you’ll have a highly scalable, reliable and cost-effective solution – one that’s part of the primary backup methodology of most enterprises recently surveyed by the Gartner Group.

If Sgt. Friday were here, he might say it takes a classic to recognize a classic solution for offsite storage. At the very least, he’d log the evidence, file his report and head on out into the cool, dark night.

For more information on when it makes sense to stick with tape, see our related eBook – Tried And True Meets Shiny And New: Making Strategic Use of Tape and Cloud Technologies for Offsite Data Protection.

Option 1: Move it over the Internet, but how long will that take?

The fact is, moving that much data over a network would take forever.  OK, maybe slightly less than forever.  Assuming an OC48 connection with 30% overhead…about 10 months.

Even if you had far less data to move – perhaps just several terabytes, you would still run up against the same problem. Because pushing large volumes of data across a network takes an incredibly long time. So strike that approach from Santa’s wish list.

Option 2: Load data onto rack appliances and then ship them to your offsite location.

You could try this method; but given the number of appliances you may require, it could become seriously expensive. And the weight of these appliances won’t put a twinkle in the reindeers’ eyes, either (think holiday hernia).

Option 3: Use tried-and-true tape storage to overcome this dilemma.

You’ve got a winner! There’s no better media to move large amounts of data.  As part of your overall offsite data protection strategy, tape storage allows you to:

• Leverage a portable, high-capacity approach to securely move large volumes of data
• Access your large volumes of data more quickly and cost-effectively compared to streaming data over a network

Meanwhile, back at Elf Central, they’re filling an Iron Mountain van with 4,000 securely packed LTO 5 tapes  to move that 6 petabytes of data. Hitched to his sleigh with turbo boosters in place, Santa and his reindeer are ready to roll – just in the nick of time!

Now dash away, all!

To learn more about which offsite data protection options might be right for you, read Tried And True Meets Shiny And New: Making Strategic Use of Tape and Cloud Technologies for Offsite Data Protection.

Earlier this year, Mat Honan, tech insider and contributor to Wired and Gizmodo, felt firsthand the effects of such an assault. His experience has revealed several key lessons for individuals and organizations to prepare for the possibility of a cyberattack. Foremost among them: always keep a copy of your data offline.

Mat Attack

Honan’s nightmare began when a hacker used phishing techniques to gain access to his Apple iCloud account. From this single chink in Honan’s digital armor, all hell broke loose. The hacker reset Honan’s iCloud password and deleted the confirmation email. He requested a new Gmail password as well, which was sent to Honan’s backup – his iCloud account. This reset was also erased. Then the hacker gained access to the @Gizmodo Twitter feed, which was linked to Honan’s own account, and proceeded to issue a string of vulgar, nonsensical tweets.

Then the hacker remotely wiped Honan’s iPhone, iPad and MacBook. Honan was unable to stop any of this, despite being aware that it was occurring.

The Aftermath

Describing the event on his blog, Honan explained that after speaking with Apple in-depth, he was told that all of the data that was stored on his Apple devices is “likely irrecoverable without serious forensics.” The consequences of this were severe. Honan noted that he did not back up his data offline – all of his backups existed either on those devices or in the cloud. He therefore lost  “more than a year’s worth of photos, emails, documents and more,” he wrote.

Lessons for Individuals

Following this event, Gizmodo offered a number of recommendations for users to avoid falling victim to a similar fate. Some of these were common wisdom. For example, Gizmodo emphasized the importance of using complex passwords, using each password only once and updating them regularly. Additionally, the source advised individuals to unlink accounts. As Honan’s experience demonstrated, failing to do so can turn a single privacy breach into a full-on disaster.

However, probably the most significant take away from this experience is the importance of backing up data offline. This is a concept that was once common sense but has gradually become less popular as users have turned to the cloud for data backup. As Honan’s experience demonstrated, however, there are significant shortcomings to cloud-exclusive data backup.

Lessons for Businesses

This is just as important for organizations as it is for individuals, as industry expert Ron LaPedis recently noted. In fact, it may be even more critical for businesses to implement offsite data backup strategies, considering the amount and value of the information most organization’s possess. If data is only stored on a firm’s computers and cloud accounts, a single hacker may be able to delete everything in a matter of hours.

While a simple external hard drive may be sufficient for an individual, LePedis recommended that organizations utilize solutions such as tape storage for their data backups. Tape is both affordable and dependable, can hold massive amounts of information and can be stored securely in an offsite facility, making it inaccessible to hackers, and providing you with a backup copy will be recoverable in the event of a hack.

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View in high-res >>

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So what data backup method should you choose? Two of the leading storage options, disk and tape storage, each have their defenders. However, as Infostor recently highlighted, tape-based systems beat out disk storage in several ways.

Reduced Cost

One of the main advantages of tape over disk storage is cost. When it comes to long-term archiving of large amounts of data, LTO-5 tape can cost as much as 15 times less than SATA disk, according to David Reine of the Clipper Group. With organizations of all sizes dealing with larger and larger quantities of data, cost savings becomes an incredibly important issue. Choosing disk storage can drain valuable resources away from an organization that could otherwise be used more productively.

Big Data

On a related note, big data is another area in which tape backup systems outperform disk storage, according to Infostor. Big data – data sets that are so large that traditional systems cannot process or analyze them effectively – has major benefits for businesses. It can yield major insight that allows the organization to improve operations and compete more effectively. Storing so much data can be a problem, though.

Infostor reported that more and more businesses of all sizes are turning to tape to store big data, thanks to the medium’s ability to handle large data sets.

Techworld recently re-emphasized this point, arguing that tape is particularly well suited for data sets that contain information that is valuable, but not necessarily mission-critical, which can account for as much as half of a business’ data.

Saved Space

Because tapes can hold so much data, most businesses need only a relatively small number of tapes. Infostor quoted Kyle Knack of National Geographic, which is a major tape user and enthusiast:

“Tape is the cornerstone of our unstructured media archiving process. We can cram many petabytes in a couple of racks of space, which provides huge cost savings. In addition, the power and cooling savings are significant,” Knack said.

What say you? Let me know what you think below.

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Well, it appears tape hasn’t quite used all nine of its lives just yet. According to industry expert George Crump, tape came full circle at the recent EMC World 2012 gathering, as the technology is once again getting the praise it deserves. Not only was a tape vendor present at the gathering, but the conference’s namesake also made waves by announcing the release of tape products.

This shift is seen as somewhat of a move to the dark side for the company. Long a proponent of disk technology, EMC embraced tape at its recent conference for one simple reason, Crump said. Tape is simply better than disk for long-term retention. It always has been and seems always will be, as innovations for tape continue to move forward.

It seems long ago industry pundits have written off tape as an irrelevant, outdated and ineffective solution for data backup and recovery programs. But as those of you in the know have always realized, there’s simply no better option than tape to ensure your data is protected.

So while 2012 has been dedicated to the 60th anniversary of tape’s debut, it’s important to keep in mind that tape never really went anywhere. Even if some tried repeatedly to kill it off. It’s been here the whole time serving organizations of all sizes and type to store, backup and, more recently, archive mission-critical data.

Big data is a trend that none of us are now able to escape. We can run, we certainly can hide, but it doesn’t seem like that will do any of us good. If it’s not already here, big data is coming in a big way.

So whether you’re a small company just getting started, or a large enterprise with multiple locations, the chances are good that you could use a little help in dealing with big data. That’s why it’s great to see more data storage vendors embracing tape – some for the first time while for others it’s more of a re-embrace of sorts. Innovations and new solutions for tape are helping organizations of all sizes deal with changing data requirements.

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It may sound crazy, but that features more than a few parallels with the history of tape technology for data storage. While tape does not make up half the Toxic Twins tandem – a moniker given to Tyler and lead guitarist Joe Perry to describe their hard-partying, rock ‘n roll lifestyles – the medium has endured for 60 years since being introduced by IBM in 1952.

Between No. 1 hits, flops, breakups, reunions and a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction, the bad boys from Boston of Aerosmith sure have been through a lot. But tape too has proven it can hang with the best of them.

As innovative as it was upon its debut, tape has undergone several revivals along the way, all of which have added to the fact that it remains many companies’ go-to solution for data backup and recovery. But new roles have also been introduced in recent years – not unlike a band naturally changes its sound throughout a prolonged career.

As other technologies have sought to challenge tape’s standing in the enterprise sector, companies are finding that its use can go beyond mere backup and recovery. Popular now is the use of tape as a long-term archiving solution thanks to its low cost and proven reliability. Among other things, that development has allowed IT departments to combine tape with hosted technologies to reap the benefits of both.

Still, stakeholders in the tape industry want to be sure the platinum status of the technology endures. So many of the top tape vendors in the United States have banded together to both promote tape storage technology, as well as commemorate its 60 years of serving companies of all sizes, working within all industries.

After all, it doesn’t appear that anything will stop tape from rocking on for another 60 years or more.

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But it’s the manner in which your company plans for the “stuff” that will determine how – or even if – it pulls through and deals with adversity. What it boils down to is having all your priorities in line.

Say an IT disaster does occur, and the proverbial stuff is thrown about. How is your company going to respond? Has it taken take the appropriate data protection measures to ensure that critical information is protected, backed up and can be recovered quickly?

Or will pandemonium set in when the lights go out, with employees running around more concerned about saving their ham sandwich than ensuring that critical assets such as backup tapes are properly stowed away and out of harm’s reach?

Today, data is everything to a company. It contains crucial employee, customer and other enterprise information. And, maybe most importantly, it’s what keeps an organization within required compliance guidelines.

Here’s the short version: Data is important, so protect it. Every company now needs a data backup and recovery strategy, plan or policy in place – something that will eliminate downtime at all costs and get your operations up and running as soon as possible should an incident occur.

And the chances are good that such responsibilities will fall into the (already crowded) lap of the IT department. Be sure your tech professionals are well-versed in data backup and recovery needs and best practices. But if they aren’t you can also entrust the process to a professional services organization.

In addition to offsite tape storage, professionals can help you take stock of the information you have produced, which will go a long way in ensuring the most important data is prioritized and can be recovered first.

Keep in mind, there’s always another ham sandwich, but if you’re not prepared properly, there’s no telling what hoops you’ll have to go through or black magic rituals you’ll have to conduct to get it back.

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