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Loading ...It is a bad week for data loss. First, Sidekick, or more specifically Danger (owned and run by Microsoft and operating the service for T-Mobile) lost a large amount of user data. People have warned about the Sidekick service for a while. Essentially, data is stored in the cloud, and not on the device. A storage network migration went (very) wrong, and Microsoft / Danger lost millions of Sidekick users’ data.
A bug has also emoerged in the latest version of Apple’s OS X, So the problem isn’t just with cloud services. This from the Guardian:
Apple has admitted that its latest operating system harbours a bug that can accidentally delete data belonging to the computer’s owner. The glitch occurs when some users who upgraded to the Snow Leopard – which was released at the end of August – log into a “guest” account on their machines. When they log back in under their own name, all of the files in their home directory – such as documents, music and videos – have been deleted.
Leading to some annoyance on the Apple discussion forums. OS X does include back up software (aka “Time Machine”) which enables users with back ups to restore their data. The moral? If your data is stored in the cloud, make sure someone is responsible for back ups – either by keeping a copy on local storage, by backing up to another provider, or by ensuring that your provider is responsible for back ups – although a recent informal survey of providers Ts and Cs left me distinctly unimpressed. Most of them boiled down to “we’ll try and backup your data, but we might not, and even if we do, we are committing that we’ll get your data back” – and that was for paid back up services!
Data is still data, wherever it is. Hard drives fail and operational errors happen. An independent (and separate) back up is the best insurance you have against these failures.
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