Most importantly, the introduction of digital data storage also changed the way we produce, manipulate and store information. The transition point took place in when digital storage became more cost-effective for storing information than paper. Digital data storage technologies are very diverse. Each type of memory is more useful to specific applications. Semiconductor memories are the preferred choice for portable electronics, optical storage is mostly used for movies, software and gaming, while magnetic data storage remains the dominant technology for high-capacity information storage, including personal computers and data servers.
Read more: A Jane Austen quote encoded in plastic molecules demonstrates the potential for a new kind of data storage. All digital data storage technologies operate on the same principles. Bits of information can be stored in any material containing two distinctive and switchable physical states.
In binary code, the digital information is stored as ones and zeroes, also known as bits. Eight bits form a byte. A logical zero or one is allocated to each physical state. The smaller these physical states are, the more bits can be packed in the storage device. The width of digital bits today is around ten to 30 nanometres billionths of a metre.
The Internet is a vast maze. It is incredibly hard to quantify and sometimes almost impossible to truly navigate. A complex array of machinery, coding, and processing power is needed to run even a single computer, much less the behemoth that is the Internet. Information on the Internet is exchanged through packets of data sent by computers to each other. A file or request for information is divided up into these packets to make the load manageable for the computer to process and the Internet connection it travels over.
Each packet can carry up to bytes of information. Each byte is comprised of eight bits of data. Each bit can either be a zero or a one. The byte system allows what humans read as words or numbers, as well as logical processes within computer applications, to be transferred from one place to another in binary. Binary is a language entirely comprised of ones and zeros.
One represents true and zero represents false. A computer at its base level reads these ones and zeros and can execute any function it is told to do. Essentially, binary acts as a set of instructions for the computer to follow. While all of this does not sound complicated, things become complex when a computer must account for billions of bytes.
Does this sound unrealistic? It means that information uploaded to the cloud in, say, the UK or the US, is likely to be transferred at some point to servers in major cities around the world, from Sydney to Shanghai. The problem with this, says Prof Dan Svantesson, an internet law specialist at Bond University, Australia, is that "there is always a risk that the country your data goes to doesn't have the same level of protection [as your own].
Benjamin Caudill, a cybersecurity consultant at Rhino Security Labs in Seattle, also has concerns about how this data is distributed. A lot of times the companies themselves aren't sure where all the data could reside. He says a client of his, who was using Microsoft's Azure cloud service, fell victim to a hack - all data and back-ups were deleted. But after some digging, it emerged that a portion of the lost data had been stored elsewhere on Azure's servers.
While that was a relief to Mr Caudill's client, the apparent random nature of data placement across Microsoft's servers didn't fill him with confidence. For their part, all the big public cloud providers say security is a priority.
At Google's server facility in South Carolina, for example, guards patrol the doors and employ biometric iris scanners at the entrances to the inner sanctum.
Underfloor laser beams detect intruders. But none would say they've never had security breaches. A Microsoft spokesperson told the BBC: "Microsoft has a customer commitment to help safeguard customer data and empower them to make decisions about that data. We recommend customers visit the Microsoft Trust Center to learn more about how their data is managed and kept secure. Amazon emphasises that customers "retain ownership and control of their content. They choose which location to store their data and it doesn't move unless the customer decides to move it.
This ability to choose which region your data is stored in is proving increasingly popular with firms, particularly in the European Union where the new stringent General Data Protection Regulation is due to come into force in It's absolutely in more than one country," says Prof Svantesson.
0コメント