It's 2003: do you know where your data is? The government is enforcing strict new guidelines on archived data. Is your company complying? - Storage Networking

Computer Technology Review, Oct, 2003 by Krishnan Padmanabhan

Case Study 2: A medium-sized Boston bank needs data storage compliant with SEC 17a-4. The company's future needs are unclear at this point; the solution must be flexible and grow with the amount of regulated data. The company runs several homegrown applications that each must be able to work with the compliant storage system.

The vendor offers compliant storage systems in a variety of sizes and performance levels. The bank can begin by buying small-capacity systems that scale up easily and open the way to substantial growth.

The company easily adapts the compliant storage systems to its homegrown software by adding a single line of code to establish the expiration date, and another to WORM the file. The storage can be expanded as needed or extra capacity of the new storage system can be used for other non-compliance purposes, improving the ROI of the technology investment.

The Bottom Line: Magnetic Disk Storage for Compliance

An examination of compliance storage options leads to the conclusion that for the great majority of customers, magnetic disk storage solutions available today offer the best combination of reliability, flexible architecture, simple implementation, cost-effectiveness, data access, and data protection for organizations that need to be in compliance with records-retention regulations.

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Krishnan Padmanabhan is director of Regulatotory Compliance Marketing at Network Appliance, Inc. (Sunnyvale, CA)