Journalist writing on hazards of cloud storage - please contribute

Bob Scheier of Scheier Associates has left a message here seeking input to a piece he his doing on the hazards of cloud storage.
http://www.scheierassociates.com/

He has told me: "I’m ideally hoping to interview companies who had posted important information on TLU and lost it when it went under, for a story I’m writing for InfoWorld about what other business customers can and should do to protect themselves against such situations. I would use quotes from those interviews in my story, which will appear on the InfoWorld Web site. Let me know if this helps, and thanks again for your help."

So if you are a company, or otherwise have a story you would like to tell, please contact Bob at:
bob@scheierassociates.com

It has been suggested by some that they may try to launch a class action for compensation, so this may be a good time to tell people where to register.

Please do let me know if you contact Bob. I'll post here when the piece is available.

Waiting for Nirvanix

As you know from reading this blog, Nirvanix said that it would try to give Mediamax users access to the files held on its servers if Mediamax agreed to provide access to its front end programme/database.

Mediamax has agreed to do so.

But I have had no response from Nirvanix responding to this offer. Nirvanix said it would not delete the files it is holding. But will it try to reunite them with their owners?

There is much that is still murky about why it may not be possible to simply restart the Mediamax system. There is also the question over whether the accidental deletion of data as the old Streamload set up was being prepared to split into Nirvanix and Mediamax is the root cause of the problems.

I think we will only really be able to proper, documented disclosure by some sort of action against the current owners of Mediamax, which appears to be Windward Ventures. I have already contacted them, but had no response. As creditors, Mediamax users who have time to run on their accounts, have a right to be notified of any bankruptcy hearing if Mediamax is wound up. Nirvanix has promised to inform us if they hear anything.

Quite a few people have emailed to say they would be interested in being part of a legal action. If you are interested and haven't emailed, please do so via my profile. If you wish to take on a coordination role, please let me know.

How to call for a Senate or Congressional Hearing?

Does anyone have experience of Senate or Congressional Hearings? I only know how things work in Brazil and the UK, where the issues this case raises might interest a politician in conducting an inquiry if the companies involved were based there.

As they are US companies, is there an existing committee that people could contact to ask it to look at the issue of data ownership and protection in the age of remote storage? Or would it be necessary to ask a Senator or Member of Congress to take some action?

A quick search of the internet has turned up sites that make it very easy to contact elected representatives, but it would be good to develop a suggested message first, with a call to action. Something short and self-explanatory along the following lines perhaps (leave comments with your opinions):

---Possible draft message
I am contacting you as your are my representative in the Senate/Congress. I request that you support an inquiry into the issue of data ownership and protection in the age of remote storage via the internet. Increasingly people are using on-line services to back up and share data.

In a current case a company has gone bankrupt meaning people will lose access to their data, some of which has been collected for years and some of which has great personal or financial value. The company that has gone bankrupt (Mediamax) sub-contracted storage to another company (Nirvanix), both of which have their origin in another company (Streamload) which made the service agreement with many of the data owners. The data on the servers is shortly to be destroyed by Nirvanix, which continues to offer third-party storage to other service companies.

An inquiry is needed to investigate :

(1) how responsbility for storing thousands of gigabytes of data were transferred from Streamload to Nirvanix without data owners having a direct relationship with Nirvanix,

(2) the deletion of millions of files, apparently due to a Nirvanix mistake, which harmed the image of Mediamax to the point its business has failed and, in particular, whether there was any deliberate intention to drive legacy customers away so space could be freed for other, possibly more lucrative, customers,

[UPDATE 29 July 2008: Although invited to comment specifically on these media reports prior to this blog opening, Nirvanix, in its reply, did not do so. Today it has emailed alleging the Techcrunch article that reproduced a comment alleging it was a Nirvanix employee who deleted the files is 'inaccurate and libelous'].

(3) the responsibility that Nirvanix, as holder of the data and successor to Streamload, has in reuniting owners with their data,

(4) data protection issues concerning the fact that users of the system found files from other people turning up in their accounts, and

(5) the general issue of ownership and protection of data stored via the internet, particularly when this is subcontracted to third parties. If current legislation will not enable people to retrieve their data from Nirvanix or receive compensation for lost data, are new laws needed?

I look forward to your views.
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