Introduction

The essence of Inescapable Data is the aggregation of potentially massive amounts of data in ways that yield new sources of information. To accomplish the aggregation, one of the goals is to keep data movingbecause data in motion has an opportunity to be accessed by more applications, resulting in greater value. Data has to rest sometime, however, and classically, it rests on storage devices. What is happening in the data storage world has a direct bearing on the functioning of an Inescapable Data world. Improvements and changes to the way data is stored and made available are comingones that will facilitate the use and management of the huge amounts of data that Inescapable Data devices will generate.

There is a general trend toward storing all data indefinitely that causes the volumes of stored data to proliferate. Some of this pack-rat behavior is motivated by regulatory agencies (SEC, FDA, etc.) bearing down on business in that they now require the saving of data for seven years (and more in some cases). E-mail messages are now being saved for indefinite periods of time by many organizations because they are considered public documents by law.

Whereas many companies now save terabytes of data, Inescapable Data devices will drive many organizations to the point of saving volumes measured in petabytes. RFID, digital video and image capture, PDAs, and cell phones all will generate massive amounts of data. The heft of digital video data alone needs to be appreciated, because it might be the last (and perhaps crippling) frontier for massive storage growth. The major challenges include the following:

• Developing the ability to sift through all of this data, often in real time, in a way that extracts information of value

• Protecting massive data volumes from loss or corruption

• Securing data that is often "in flight" over wired and wireless connections from theft or destruction by malicious forces