Businesses failing to deal with threat of vital company data becoming unreadable in future

Dominic Johnstone, Head of Information Management Services at Crown Records Management

Businesses are facing the significant prospect that vital data could become obsolete or unreadable in future, after a survey revealed they aren’t doing enough to prevent it.

As technology advances at an ever-faster rate the prospect of previously popular formats becoming obsolete is growing all the time.

Already files produced in Word Perfect or Lotus 123, movie clips and photographs stored in the .MOV format and information stored on floppy disks are in real danger of becoming unreadable in the near future.

Now a survey commissioned by Crown Records Management and undertaken by Censuswide has unveiled the real size of the problem and showed just how badly businesses could be affected if businesses do not wake up to the threat.

The survey showed that: 

• More than half, 57 per cent, do not regularly review the formats on which data is stored.
• Another 12 per cent have no system in place to preserve data stored for longer than five years.
• Less than half treat records and non-records differently with a view to long-term archiving and searching.
• Almost a third said they aren’t concerned about the threat of data becoming unreadable in future – one of the highest results across the whole UK. 

Dominic Johnstone, Head of Information Management Services at Crown Records Management, said: “These results provide a real insight into what is a compelling topic for all businesses now and in the near future, particularly in Manchester.

“Long term digital preservation hasn’t made big headlines so far but many companies may be in for a shock because the reality is that any information which is 10 years old or more is seriously at risk.

“The speed at which software and hardware evolves is forcing old formats to quickly become obsolete and there is no guarantee they will be readable in future.

“For so many businesses to have no system in place to preserve electronic data stored for the long-term – and for so many to say they aren’t even concerned - is a big worry. There is a lot of work to be done.”

Johnstone is aware that many businesses simply store their information in the cloud in the belief it is safe; but they frequently don’t consider how, or if, it will be read in 10 or 20 years’ time.

He said: “It’s not surprising that cloud storage is so popular, it’s a relatively cheap and safe way to store information. But if the attached systems are not upgraded then there really is no guarantee all that information can be accessed and read when you really need it.

“The big worry is that many businesses may find their corporate information is lost in the long term.”