What Is Data Recovery

What Is Data Recovery?
By Pushkar Sinha

Retrieving deleted/inaccessible data from electronic storage media (hard drives, removable media etc...)

Typical causes of data loss include:

o Electro-mechanical Failure

o Natural Disaster

o Viruses

o Data Corruption

o Sabotage

o Human Error

Is Data Recovery important?

Over the past years, hard drives have gotten a lot quieter and faster, with capacities of more then 350 GB. The downside is that their consistency is far from perfect, and the devices are often burdened with mechanical failures, this warning however is never mentioned in the vendors' product specifications.

Our experience for over a decade shows that users can be sub-divided into two groups. The first group of users is well informed or has already experienced the sting of losing data. In cases such as these, the user is careful to back up information such as emails, photos, document files and financial data on a CD/DVD or other media, at least on an asymmetrical basis. A corporate user has the IT department or an administrator one who takes care of his backups. Digital assets are thus protected however still a virus attack, hardware failure or simply human error can destroy this critical asset. However, this group is a small minority.

The other group lives with an enduring risk, either because they aren't aware of the possible horror scenario or often it is the case, they don't take it seriously enough. It should be clear to everyone that any multifaceted component at any day may fail to provide its services. If such a scenario occurs, then all the data stored exclusively on a hard drive would most likely be lost.