Do you have Gigabytes of information stored on your server that you’ll never use, but feel like you should keep? You are not alone. Given expanding regulatory rules and the key role that electronic records now play in law suits, some businesses go so far as to save every bit of data they have.. In fact, reports that the total amount of disk storage shipped last year grew 42.5 percent from 2008, proving that many businesses are opting to save much more of their information, rather than deleting it.

 
You may be thinking, “So why should I worry about our data storage?” or “What’s the big deal in keeping everything?” While it is true that even offsite data storage costs have gone down by about 20% this year, the simple fact is that keeping your data forever can create long-term management challenges and lead to headaches when something needs to be found. Most often companies that save everything don’t do so because they think it’s the best way, but because they aren’t sure what needs to be saved or deleted.
 
Certainly every organization needs to save information for its own purposes, such as transactions, accounting records, analytical data, and so on.  Not only that, but regulations such as the Sarbanes-Oxley Act and the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) require enterprises to save certain kinds of content for a prescribed period.  You may not be hit by these acts, but rest assured more regulations are in the works.
 
Data retention is a balancing act.  Keep too much and not only will the cost of eDiscovery in a law suit (even a frivolous one) be astronomical, but you also increase the risk of damaging findings being discovered.  On the other hand, delete data without a specific and rigorously enforced retention policy and you’re not likely to receive the benefit of the doubt with the courts as to why requested information is not available.
 
What should be done? 

To address the problem, here are 4 data retention strategies you must consider:
 
1.)    Start with the storage analysis, not the storage technology or procedures.  Know what data has to be kept and for how long.  Many times requirements are dictated by industry or legal requirements.  There are software tools to help you in analyzing what information is stored on your servers and how it’s used.

2.)     Segment user populations.  Use categories such as executives, back-office employees, sales, and people who deal with the company’s intellectual property and treat their data differently.  You certainly don’t need to keep back office transactional data as long as executive strategic communications.
3.)    Be precise and consistent with data retention policies.  Carefully crafted and enforced policies will more often than not be deemed legally defensible causing less legal exposure and dramatically lowering the cost of eDiscovery.
4.)    Don’t confuse back-up with archiving.  Since backup systems don’t generally have the granular control needed to save some types of information for a short time and others for longer, using them as archival systems can be costly and risky.  For example, if a certain business record needs to be saved for seven years, the wrong place to save it is on a backup tape with 65,000 other files.
                                  
Avoid the expense and hassle of having too much data by having and enforcing strong policies and using proper tools to maintain independent data archives.  We can assist you in identifying best practices and cost effective software tools for your business.  Contact ProTech Networks and let us help you with your precious data.