nt to the task of protecting IT data. But little attention appears to have been paid to the physical plant, to the reach of impact that events in nature could have on data, or to the physical vulnerability of electronic equipment to water and dirt. One may credibly assume that the technical machinery was cobbled together in a serviceable way but with no data-protection strategy in view; that is proved by the absence of a firewall on one hand and the heedless exposure to the weather and elements of the American South on the other. Even had no water line broken, the company's computers would have been extraordinarily vulnerable to the damp and hot climate of the region. That is a point to which this research will return.
Let us assume that data salvage and recovery can be accomplished. The method for mitigating and preparing against the risk of future emergency becomes important. One such method is known as the redundant array of independent disks, or RAID. The core concept is redundancy, meaning that data are not meant to be stored in one dedicated physical place but may be retrievable from multiple sources. The use of disks is also important. As has been noted, "tape is the quintessential data backup medium," but it is slow and cumbersome: "Many organizations work in a global 24/7 marketplace and cannot afford to go offline fo
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