Top Causes of Data Loss

Despite a lot of steps that are taken to prevent data loss, it continues to happen. Simply because of the volume of data and the fact that it is stored in various forms, it is virtually impossible to completely curb data loss.

Data loss occurs due to various reasons. Natural disasters like fire, floods, hurricanes, lightning, tornadoes, earthquakes etc. have been responsible for huge volumes of data loss. Apart from natural disasters, technical faults also result in data loss. Technical data loss could arise from computer viruses, hard drive crash, PC power failure, backup media degradation etc.

Hard Drive Malfunction

Statistics reveal that the biggest cause for data loss is hard drive malfunction. Nearly 44% of all data losses that occur are attributed to a faulty hard drive or a head crash. The hard disk despite its name is not a very hardy device and extremely prone to wear and tear. The hard drive has an estimated lifespan of 3 years.

A hard disk is made up of a series of platters which rotate at a very high speed. Even the slightest disturbance or dust particle can cause the hard drive to crash, leading to data loss. A sudden jerk or dropping the hard drive will definitely result in data loss.

Virus Attacks

A computer virus is a computer program that can copy itself and infect a computer without the knowledge of a user. A virus can spread from one computer to another when the host is transferred over a network. Virus attacks are dreaded by every computer user as it wreaks havoc and results in great data loss. Since it can be easily transmitted, it becomes difficult to guard every storage device against it.

Some viruses are designed to damage a computer by damaging programs, deleting files or reformatting a hard disk. Though there exists anti-virus software to prevent virus attacks, there are always new viruses on the prowl that a user is not protected against. It is, therefore, difficult to protect data against every kind of virus.

Natural Disasters

While a computer user may be protected against data loss due to technical problems, it is difficult to be protected against natural disaster. Since earthquakes, storms, floods etc are largely unpredicted, one may be caught completely unawares. The greater the extent of damage caused by the disaster, greater is the data loss. In fact, if the volume of data lost is extremely large, some companies find it difficult to recover and eventually shut shop.

While technical data loss is usually recoverable, data loss due to natural disasters can be extremely difficult to retrieve. To prevent data loss due to natural disaster, companies are increasingly storing data using online backup or remote backup. However, the average computer user still uses conventional backup media which are susceptible to physical damage.

Terrorist Attacks

While there have been terrorist attacks for decades that have affected functioning due to data loss, it was perhaps the 9/11 attacks that revealed the magnitude of data loss that could happen. Caught completely unawares, companies and individuals lost unimaginable amounts of data that it was hard to recover from.

Apart from terrorist attacks, there are also instances of focussed industrial espionage where professionals can be used to steal valuable data from rival companies. Forensic experts kick into action when data loss happens due to theft.

Human Error

Data loss can also happen because of human error. Amateur computer users can delete files unintentionally causing data loss. If files are inadvertently written over, one is sure of losing data permanently. A user may forget to save files and create backups all of which could result in data loss.

Mishandling of a computer or rough handling of storage media can cause inadvertent data loss. However, more often than not, data loss due to human error can be retrieved unless extreme physical damage is caused.

Conclusion

The worst part of data loss is perhaps the inconvenience and the cost of recovering it. It is only in the rare event of drastic physical damage or a badly carried out recovery job that data loss is permanent. Needless to say, if the data loss is small, then it is easy to overcome, but if it is too huge to handle, it can be catastrophic.

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About the Article Author

James Walsh is a freelance writer and copy editor. If you are concerned about data loss and would like more information on Data Recovery see www.fields-data-recovery.co.uk

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