A research conducted by an accounting firm revealed that one out of every 500 data centers in the world will experience a data disaster in the next one year. This could mean that a majority of businesses can run out of business.
Data loss is happening every moment in some part of the world or the other. The price that you pay for data that is lost is heavy, especially if it constitutes your priced and cherished memories. Though it is happening in your lives and mine, we somehow fail to admit it. Let us start talking reality.
Of all forms of data losses that occur, the people who are most affected are ones like you and me. A friend of mine, who was a famous photographer, lost some of his precious work last year, when his hard drive was completely wiped out by virus. Though data stored in these media is recoverable in 90-95% of cases, we are still at a higher risk.
Loss & Recovery – A True Story
I am not sure if this comes out of habit, but I make every effort to preserve every moment of my life. Let me talk about my passion for photography. Every cherished moment of my life has been recorded that includes my graduation, marriage, children's birthday, vacations and the list goes on. I have always treasured these memories and taken good care of them. But then the day arrived.
We were just back from a long vacation. It was past ten at night. As always, I was doing my regular job of transferring some of the videos, which we had shot during the vacation, onto my computer. There was a heavy storm lashing across the city.
All of a sudden, the power went off and I was sitting all alone in the darkness. Helping myself a little, groping in the dark, I lighted a candle and placed it in a corner of a room. Soon the power was back. I was tired: I slid into the bedroom and was soon in a deep slumber. In the middle of the night, I smelt something smoldering.
Quickly getting on my feet, I looked around. Everything seemed to be fine. Then something struck me like a lightning. The candle….. I quickly rushed to my home office room and opened the door. Gosh! The entire room was on fire… For a moment, I didn’t know how to react.
I quickly woke up my neighbour John and sought his help to call the fire service. Meanwhile, I tried entering the room and salvaging as much as possible. I could see my treasures burning right in front of me. Owing to the rough weather outside, the fire services came in a bit late. The fire was put off, but the damage was already done.
It was seven in the morning. I was slowly clearing up the mess. My precious collection- all was gone. I picked up the set of soot-covered CDs and DVDs and went out to put them into the trash. Suddenly, a hand stopped me. I looked up in surprise and found it was John. He asked me if he could have all those CDs and DVDs. I wondered of what use those could be to him. Anyway, I handed them off and walked away.
Time passed by and everything was forgotten. I had to start my collection from scratch. Two months later, when everything seemed to jump back to normal, I hosted a party for my fourth wedding anniversary. John came in and handed me a huge pack. He came close and told me that I would indeed cherish his gift for a lifetime. I became a bit curious.
Immediately after the party, I quickly opened the gift wrapper. To my surprise, I found it to be a DVD rack cleanly lined up with numerous DVDs. Were those empty DVDs or did they have something in them? I picked one of those and inserted into the drive. When I opened it, I was in for one of the greatest surprises in my life. What I found there were indeed my valuable collections.
But something else surprised me. I quickly dropped into John’s home and thanked him for his awesome gift. When questioned about how he managed to retrieve them, he told me that he had taken the help of data recovery services professionals to accomplish this task. I internally thanked and commended the work of these professionals, if not for whom I could have lost my life’s most valued treasures. Thank you.