By Jeffrey Lewis, Records Analyst at Zimmerman Associates Incorporated
June 29, 2012 - 1:35 PM
When managing electronic records, particularly those in the cloud, security is of utmost importance. Paper records, because of our long history with them, have proven to be less challenging to keep secure. It is every records manager's worst nightmare when their secure offsite storage location turns out to be not so secure.
This is the case for many organizations in the DC area who use "Recall" as offsite storage vendor. When you do a search for "recall records management" in google, the blurb for their website states, "Recall is a leading provider of effective and secure document management." After recent events in a storage facility in Landover, MD they may want to rephrase that statement. WTOP reports the following:
Employees at Recall, a document management company on Cabin Branch Drive told firefighters a forklift accidentally struck a storage rack that toppled and created a domino effect Thursday night. The falling shelves struck support beams, then the roof collapsed and walls buckled.
Most likely the building will end up being condemned. I am not sure what accessibility will look like for getting to the records that are stored there. Cases like this show why it is important to have a facility that is compliant with NARA or some other standard. An offsite storage contract should state how long it can take to retrieve records, hopefully "Recall" has a long retrieval period in case there is an e-discovery case which needs those records.
Has anyone ever encountered a situation like this? What changes did you make going forward and how did it affect your current records management processes in the time being.
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