Data explosion shakes up IT
631419
(InfoWorld) - In just three years, the bytes of data generated by digital cameras, mobile phones, businesses IT systems, and devices will equal the number of grains of sand on the world's beaches. It's a mind-boggling estimation from market analysis company IDC. But it reflects the proliferation of devices and systems used by consumers and businesses, said Stephen Minton, IDC's vice president of worldwide IT markets and strategies, during a briefing on Thursday. Over the next few years, corporations will face tough decisions on how to store data, find information and comply with regulations, said Minton, who laid out a forecast of what IT managers can expect from what's being labeled the "information explosion." It won't be an easy task. While 85 percent of that data is predicted to come from consumers snapping photos, surfing Web pages, and sending e-mail, about 60 percent of that consumer data will still cross corporate networks, Minton said. Much of the data is unstructured, meaning it's not clearly labeled as to its content, such as photos, video, and perhaps phone recordings, which makes it more difficult to use. But technologies that enable deep analysis of the data are emerging, and could help business unlock what's important and improve their operations. The mass of data companies are collecting -- the retailer Wal-Mart Stores, for example, generates 1TB of transactional data a day -- represents huge business opportunities "if companies can really get to a point where they can successfully analyze the data going back and forth on their network," Minton said. Companies are "still a long way short of being able to analyze the unstructured data on their networks," he said. The data is coming from Web services such as the photo-sharing site Flickr, Skype, and even the virtual world Second Life. The business opportunities are the positive side. But the security concerns still abound, as well as regulatory compliance and liability worries. According to data from the U.S. Computer Emergency Response Team, the number of reported software vulnerabilties declined in 2003 and 2004 but surged in 2005 to around 6,000, an all-time high. "This explosion in the number of applications and devices has created an explosion in the number of security vulnerabilities," Minton said. The security and reliability of those IT systems has become so important that the IT department now has "a direct impact on the company's top and bottom line," Minton said. Customer experiences and the company'sÂ image are at stake when security fails, he said. Accordingly,Â security has remained the top budget priorityÂ over the last five or six years, with 60 percent of companies placing it as the highest one in an IDC survey conducted earlier this year. IDC is predicting that revenue from security and vulnerability management software products will grow by 20 percent this year over 2006, to $2.27 billion. That far outpaces the 6 percent to 7 percent growth expected for the software industry as a whole. When a report of a data breach hits the front page that "has a very bad impact on a company's brand image," Minton said.
526247
Researchers conclude that the world generated 161 billion gigabytes of digital info last year. And there's barely enough room to store it all. By the Associated Press.
531165
Researchers in London are developing DVDs that could hold 100 times more data than current discs.
158980
An increasing number of firms are offering web storage for people with digital photo collections.
689451
By BRIAN BERGSTEIN BOSTON - A new study that estimates how much digital information the world is generating (hint: a lot) finds that for the first time, there's not enough storage space to hold it all. Good thing we delete some stuff.
673371
In just three years, the bytes of data generated by digital cameras, mobile phones, businesses IT systems, and devices will equal the number of grains of sand on the world's beaches.
660238
New data classification tools can inspect content, identify patterns, and generally provide greater insight into the purpose and value of a particular file. Some of these applications also provide extensive indexing capabilities, as well.
270377
Metaweb Technologies is setting out to create a vast public database, paving the way for a more automated Internet.
510349
GOOGLE caused a stir when it announced recently that its search engine can now look for data that is stored in users&#39; computers.
636027
Imperial College London researchers in the UK are developing a new way of storing data that could lead to discs capable of holding 1,000 gigabytes.
736505
A new project called Digital Universe aims to make information on the Web better organized and more authoritative
490333
As a new PLM rollout is planned, a new requirement suddenly crops up. Data will be shared with outsiders, and Mathias Thurman wants it all done securely.
55344
Faulty data: Everybody has it, and it can ruin your business. Here are some tips for finding it, fixing it and keeping it clean.
515204
Backup volumes in many organizations have grown so large that they are causing business disruption by tying up systems, storage, and network capacity and hogging valuable IT resources, according to a recent survey commissioned by storage management software vendor BridgeHead Software.More than half (59 percent) of IT executives said that the volume of data they are forced to backup is disrupting business operations or will do so eventually, according to a survey of 472 IT executives in the U.K. and North America. And the problem is not going away, with 93 percent saying that their routine backup volumes are continuing to increase.The problem is consuming IT resources for long periods with 37 percent admitting that daily backups of primary data now take them more than nine hours, while 19 percent said it took them more than 12 hours.More than two-thirds (84 percent) of those polled felt they could benefit by reducing the volume of data they routinely back up. Among the chief advantages highlighted were:* Less IT time devoted to backup and other business continuity processes (69 percent) * A reduction in the impact of backup and replication on network utilization and capacity (60 percent) * A reduction in disk resources devoted to data snapshotting, replication, and mirroring (58 percent) * Reduced disruption to the live application environment (45 percent)One of the most effective ways of reducing the pressure on backups is to take information that is static or seldom accessed and archive it off primary storage systems according to BridgeHead Software CEO Tony Cotterill."Sixty-one percent of organizations in our survey admit that between 30 to 50 percent of data on their primary disk is unlikely to be accessed ever again, yet they are squandering time and resources on backing up and replicating this big chunk of static data. It's a very poor use of resources," said Cotterill.BridgeHead said its research reveals that many organizations are starting to use archiving for specific types of data, such as e-mails, motivated by compliance and disaster recovery. According to the company, a lot of archiving activity is currently championed by finance and other business departments outside of IT's control.But to have a major impact on backup volumes, BridgeHead reckoned that there needs to be an IT-driven move away from point solutions or isolated archive appliances towards taking an organization-wide approach to archiving, allowing IT to retrieve control by archiving all data types across the organization from a single point."If you can take an organization-wide approach to archiving, then the volume of data you're taking off the primary store will start to reach a critical mass that will help call a halt to increasing backup volumes," said Cotterill.The survey was part of BridgeHead Software's Annual Information Lifecycle Management Audit, conducted by eMedia on behalf of BridgeHead Software during August 2007. eMedia surveyed 324 senior level executives, IT managers, system and network administrators and engineers from North America and 148 from the U.K.Techworld is an InfoWorld affiliate
107131
Soon on sale: hardware and software from a start-up whose software with a new approach for protecting data by dispersing it across several servers--and maybe even continents.
660810
The Barracuda 7200.8 series packs more data on the hard-drive platters.
612313
Disagreement regarding passenger data could ground thousands of flights.