"Digital information lasts forever – or five years, whichever comes first." - Jeff Rothenberg
Realizing how easily digital files can be altered can be overwhelming. Active security and management are critical.
It is essential that any planning you do in your office concerning the retention of electronic records take into account the financial and human resources needed to maintain electronic records and the software, hardware, and storage needed to preserve them.
Never trust claims that you won't have to actively manage records over time. Recognize that hardware and software are going to change. Make sure that you have a way to get your records out of proprietary or vendor-based systems.
No matter what changes you make to ensure access, it's important to keep the original bit-stream – the original file, in its original format – to be able to prove the record's history and provenance.
And active management also means checking on these files periodically to make sure that they are still accessible – that all of the technology required to read that file is still working properly, and the media on which the files are stored are still readable.
Digital archives follow the LOCKSS principle: Lots Of Copies Keeps Stuff Safe. Make sure you have back-ups of your data. Keep multiple copies in multiple locations. Consider storing files in more than one file format simultaneously; for example, as a rich text format file and PDF.
We've already reviewed the limitations of proprietary software. Make sure that the policies and standards your office adopts are supported by several vendors, so that if one company goes out of business, you can still access your data.
Once you have committed to preserving your electronic records, there are some steps to take to prevent problems with storage media and file formats.
Refreshing is replacing the media on which digital files are stored. For example, considering the lifespan of some CDs and DVDs, you might want to refresh data on older discs every two or three years.
Migration is converting your files to a new format or a new version of a format. You could migrate your .doc files to .rtf format, for example. This is useful when collaborating with colleagues who might be using different software; migrating files to a less proprietary format will ensure accessibility.
Emulation is backwards programming that enables modern computers to read old programming languages. One of the most popular examples of this is emulating 1980s video games to play them on your computer today. You can now play Pacman and Oregon Trail, for example, and they will look just as they did twenty years ago. Emulation is not really something your office wants to incorporate into policies and planning. It's useful to know about, but given the technical knowledge needed, you probably are not going to consider it unless there's a situation involving permanent records with no other alternatives.
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Date last modified: October 29, 2008.
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