Off-site tape vaulting is an essential part of any disaster recovery plan

The key reason we back up data is to ensure that an organization has copies of essential data in case of a disaster. With that in mind, it's time to look at off-site tape vaulting, which is the secure storage of backup tapes away from your primary IT infrastructure. This brings up two questions: How far off-site should I vault tapes? How often should they be moved there?

Dealing with the last question first, the question of how often to vault tapes is dictated by your recovery point objective. If the minimum amount of data you can realistically stand to lose is 24 hours' worth, then you should vault backup tapes every 24 hours.

The big mistake many small and medium size enterprises fall into here is to not send a tape off-site until it's full because it may seem like a waste of tape capacity or they have pricing concerns. While saving a few pounds on tapes may seem worthwhile, if a tape you've taken days to fill is destroyed in a fire, you'll lose far more than the tape. So, you should buy more tapes and send them off-site as often as your recovery point requires. Another reason we may avoid off-site tape vaulting is because we want to keep tapes on-site so data is accessible in case of erroneous deletion by a user, or there's a file corruption issue and we need to restore from the original tape. But don't let this be a reason to not send tapes off-site. The answer is to make two copies: retaining one copy for a fast file restore (if needed) and sending the other off-site.

As to where and how far off-site you should vault tapes, this will vary according to the likely threat your business faces. Fire could destroy an office building, so moving tapes to another floor would be inadequate protection. Moving tapes to a nearby office may also prove useless if both locations are in a flooding or known earthquake zone. Keeping tapes or thumb drives in a car has its obvious disadvantages. Therefore, having an up-to-date disaster recovery strategy that deals with the issue of data backup and off-site vaulting is critical.

The conditions in which tapes are vaulted is also important. Tapes should be handled according to manufacturer recommendations in terms of temperature and humidity. To ignore this could result in a loss of data or reduced tape life.

One way of dealing with issues arising from the need to store tapes off-site in an optimal fashion is to engage a tape vaulting services company. This type of service provides collection of tapes, storage in temperature and humidity controlled premises, as well as insurance against loss or damage to media. Another option is electronic vaulting, a term that encompasses nearly any method of backing up data over a network to a remote location also known as cloud storage, today.

The smart choice is to have Offsite Data Depot manage your vault storage. Offsite provides these services at a very affordable rate, usually 50% less than their competitors. To get more information on how to protect your company’s information contact an Offsite representative at (775) 888-9933 or e-mail: sales@offsitedatadepot.com.

The Intelligent Archive-Going Beyond Intelligent Capture

Regardless of your industry of focus, you are sure to have heard the word archive. But what does archive
really mean? And does it mean the same thing to you as it does to the person in the next office? Is an
archive just a repository where documents are stored never to be found again? Or is an archive something
that can actually provide a benefit, or even better, a measurable ROI?


Because of the high demand for timely record retrieval, organizations both large and small need to look to a
content management system that will enable them to securely and accurately store their records with as
much information as possible so that the documents can be recalled quickly, creating an intelligent archive.
This involves utilizing technology that can locate and recognize varying writing styles or mixed documenttypes
and layouts so that once digital, the information can be searched, with keywords or phrases identified
for fast retrieval.


Considering that documents are being imaged, how do you then make the documents intelligent meaning
searchable and reportable and the archive a beneficial tool for the organization? Data capture and routing
is critical, although not an easy feat for most recognition technologies and something that requires advanced
capabilities beyond simple rules-based classification or common OCR or ICR.


Great strides have been made in the ability to automatically locate, extract, search, and index data from
electronic documents including those of an unstructured format. Technology now allows digitized documents
to be analyzed and indexed on a holistic or transaction level in relation to one another, as well as by their
geometric layout and content characteristics. The documents can then be searched for pre-defined elements
or keywords and, in addition to being archived, the results may be incorporated into pre-existing discovery,
redaction, declassification, or document management systems thus providing unparalleled access to the
information. Users maintain privacy and adhere to compliance regulations, as complex and handwritten
significant difference in the efficiency of the tasks that were previously performed by hand, by allowing the
processes to become automated from initial capture through to archive. documents are no longer a bottleneck
requiring manual processing. Advanced technologies make a


Many still believe that unstructured or complex documents can only be keyed and, given the demands of
today’s market, any automated solution must be at least as error-free as the manual processes it replaces.
However, accuracy is equally as important as successful discovery, due diligence, compliance, and
declassification features found in today’s more advanced recognition and classification engines.


Additionally, those looking to implement such an archiving solution must also examine the definition of and
metrics around success. The question should not only be, “What is the read rate?” but also, “How much can
be automated, how much time can be saved, how much manual labor can be eliminated, and how robust
and comprehensive of a database can be built for search?” The ROI produced for organizations adopting this
technology is not only seen in terms of a savings on their bottom line, but also in terms of the time saved
through newly realized efficiencies. And once scanned, complex data that was automatically located and
extracted can be entered into the IT system and more quickly distributed to those that need it, as well as
indexed for archive and retrieval based on complex queries within the newly built database. This increase in
accessible and search-able information from a central repository not only speeds knowledge distribution, but
it elevates the organization’s global intelligence.


With new regulations and the continued movement towards the paperless office, organizations must consider
more than just how to get their documents into electronic format, but what they will do once these documents
are scanned. By utilizing the right tools for capturing all data and indexing all documents, an archive can
easily make the transition to intelligent archive.


By Wendi Klein, director of marketing & communications, North America, A2iA

Healthcare IT: Electronic Medical Records Backup and Recovery

Electronic medical records (EMR) back up, recovery, and data retention requirements are the very backbone of HIPAA regulations. It’s mission critical for health care providers to maintain proper back-up systems, access reliable recovery, and retain historical data properly all within a secure environment.

HIPAA requires that sensitive health data be encrypted and stored in specific, tightly-regulated ways. So not only are medical practices, hospitals, and rehabilitation centers producing more and more electronic records at an exponential rate, all of those files have to be stored indefinitely, in a specific manner, and most importantly, be recoverable.

Small Practices Must Look to Managed Services

Yet the resources available to large hospitals and other health care organizations are out of reach for most small family practices. In most cases, they won’t have appropriate internal IT resources and won’t have the budget for large-scale EMR systems. This is the target area where managed services providers will be able to make the best inroads.

The market for small, office-based practices is ripe for the picking. According to the health care marketing research firm SK&A, only 29% of solo practices and 37% of two-physician practices currently use EMR. So the majority of these small practices need a fully loaded EMR solution, from systems to backup, and don’t yet have one. Better still, they have government money at their disposal to upgrade their data management systems.

But be cautioned: before a managed services provider can break into the health care industry, the service they provide must meet all regulatory standards regardless if their client’s practice has only one doctor or is 50 strong.

Make Sure Your Backup Provider is HIPAA Compliant and Beyond

Evaluate your providers and make sure that they can not only meet your current needs, but will be able to support your future aspirations for your business as well.

Take Intronis’ white label solution, for example. Not only are we fully HIPAA compliant, we’re SAS 70 Type II certified, and our level of encryption is the same type that is used in online banking. In addition, our data centers are located on opposite coasts, and we have never lost any client data, ever.

Data Retention Rules

One important backup feature you should look for is retention capabilities. Part of the tech specs that makes Intronis’ solution HIPAA compliant is our ability to store an unlimited number of revisions something that a consumer-grade backup solution just can’t offer.

Plan for the Future Now

However, if you’re not planning to get into this highly-regulated industry soon, it may be tempting to start out with a consumer-grade cloud backup solution for your clients. Don’t do this start out with a HIPAA compliant solution or switch now if you aren’t using one already.

Having some of your clients on one solution and some on another is both an administrative and technical nightmare. Besides, you don’t want to lose sleep by offering a solution to any of your clients that isn’t secure or recoverable.

The same logic applies to all your solutions, not just backup security, mobile support, infrastructure, etc. Build your business on quality services, and you’ll be primed to take up health care clientele when the time is right.

Copyright © 2003-2011 Intronis, Inc. All rights reserved. 

Records Storage & Management Benefits

Check out this SlideShare Presentation on the many benefits of using a professional records management company.

Records Storage & Management Benefits

View more presentations from Gerd Poppinga.