Richards & Richards

There is never an upside to identity theft, but if there were, it would be an increased awareness of the importance of protecting business data from unauthorized access. In the wake of the Target breach, companies are taking more precautionary measures to prevent their information from falling into the wrong hands. Yet to focus only on the criminal is short sighted; there are a number of other threats to your data that can have a lasting effect on your business.

Mistakes, negligence, and Mother Nature

Unintentional file loss—endemic to organizations constantly accessing and sharing information—is even more likely than malicious intent. Accidents are bound to happen at one time or another, especially when all it takes is an unintentional strike on the “delete” key. Yet, human error isn’t the only contributor to data loss:

If backup data is created on a scheduled basis and proper post backup procedures are in place, files can quickly be restored and downtime minimized.

If the same diligence given to creating backups was also focused on protecting the media assets to which data is transferred and stored, more companies would be able to easily bounce back from catastrophic data loss. Frequently, media assets remain at the exact location where the initial backup took place, exposing them to damage from fire and other natural disasters as well as degradation from environmental factors. Often, this is due to a misguided desire for “convenient” access to backup data. However, it frequently results in greater mismanagement of backup inventory and exposure to environmental factors that have a direct impact on the integrity of media storage devices:

How professional data protection prevents data loss and facilitates recovery

A professional data protection solution mitigates these factors by offering a dedicated vault for the storage of magnetic media containing vital and sensitive business data. Here, all backup data can be protected against fire and water damage and other negative environmental factors. Additionally, it ensures long-term preservation capabilities in accordance with internal and/or regulatory and legal information retention guidelines. Media can be professionally rotated in a timely manner prior to backup and tracked with an information management database which provides an auditable and searchable record of each tape stored offsite.

Verify, verify, verify

Never assume that all of your backup information has been transferred and stored correctly. You don’t want to be in an emergency data loss situation with an inability to restore critical files. It’s important to verify that all information has been successfully transferred and written to your data storage media. Most data recovery experts recommend disaster recovery testing at a minimum of every six months. Your media vaulting and rotation partner can be a tremendous resource in helping you determine your recovery time objectives (RTOs).

Richards & Richards provides businesses throughout the Nashville area with comprehensive data protection solutions. For more information please contact us by phone or fill in the form on this page.

NASHVILLE – (April 4, 2014) Richards & Richards today announced it has completed installation of its new FireLock DataVault, a fireproof storage facility for companies and individuals who need the highest possible level of protection for computer back-up tape, magnetic media and other sensitive items.

“Our customers expect peace of mind and trust that their most important assets are safe,” said Steve Richards, Richards & Richards’ CEO. “As a company that has been through a disaster, we are all too familiar with the destruction caused by heat and other elements.”

“This is just one of a small number of vaults of this caliber in the Southeast and the only one in Nashville. We felt it was important that Nashville have this type of resource, especially in light of the data storage needs connected with so many growing technology companies, the music business and other industries with a large technological presence,” Richards said. “This vault protects not only from fire, but from wind, water and even dust. It’s the same vault system used by the U.S. Department of Defense to protect mission-critical server centers.”

The FireLock DataVault, which was built inside Richards & Richards’ high-security Elm Hill Pike location, is constructed from ceramic fiber walls designed to protect media from heat.  This is a Firelock Class 125 media rated facility, Zone 4 seismic rated, data protection facility.  A Faraday steel cage provides complete magnetic shielding for all DataVault contents and will protect magnetic media from any outside magnetic force including an EMP blast.  It is the only DataVault in Middle Tennessee that meets NFPA 75 and NFPA 232 standards for magnetic media.  The vault’s design allows for expansion and contraction under high-heat conditions, rather than buckling.

“Storing in the DataVault is affordable and incredibly secure,” Richards said. “We still have some slots available for those who will need them.”

About Richards & Richards:

For more than 25 years, Richards & Richards has provided the highest level of professional records and information management services throughout Middle Tennessee. Focusing on traditional records management services, Richards & Richards offers records storage, data protection, paper shredding, tape and media destruction, computer hard drive destruction, e-vaulting, scanning services and litigation support.

With more than 1,900 clients storing their records in its 251,000-square-foot records center, Richards & Richards is the oldest and largest single-market, independently owned and operated records management company in Tennessee.

Contact for media inquiries:

Leigh Lindsey

615-259-4000

llindsey@mpf.com

As the use of digital files takes hold within law firms, litigation support is increasingly associated with e-discovery processes. Since case information still exists in hardcopy format, though, litigation support functions must include the preparation and management of paper trial documents. However, in-house document production can quickly consume administrative resources. Ensuring that hardcopy records are produced in a timely and accurate manner means providing proper resources and solutions to your legal secretary and paralegal staff throughout the litigation process.

Ensuring appellate briefs are accurate and meet compliance deadlines

The filing of appellate briefs is a deadline-driven, paper-based process. And compliance with court requirements means completing procedural and technical items correctly and on time. Since a single file is comprised of thousands of pages, documentation must be processed quickly without sacrificing accuracy. Outsourcing your appellate brief processing and filing obligations ensures that every file page is checked with professional quality control standards, is error-free, and meets all compliance deadlines while enabling support staff to focus on additional administrative tasks vital to your firm.

Copying and file preparation

Success at a deposition, trial or during arbitration is highly dependent on how evidentiary documents, discovery documents, and trial records are presented. High-quality file reproductions must be produced within a short time period. Therefore, it’s important to have a reliable resource that can ensure the presentation materials meet the highest quality standards and support your case. You’ll want to take into consideration the capabilities of your legal copying vendor in order to ensure a solution for a wide range of litigation support functions your firm may need, including:

Digitization of paper litigation documents

Supporting your legal secretaries and paralegals is all about making sure that they are able to use their litigation support time efficiently and effectively. Digitizing paper records streamlines the case management process for both small-scale and large-scale litigation. A professional legal document scanning company can provide a turnkey solution for converting paper litigation files to electronic files which are then managed within a case management system. This allows for litigation files to be imaged in a variety of output formats in a fraction of the time and cost it would take to do digitize documents within your firm, and also provides wide-ranging functionality. Strict image quality assurance processes—handled by screened, professional imaging technicians—ensure high-quality and quick turnarounds to meet trial requirements:

Additionally, by imaging paper litigation documents, the resources and time needed to retrieve, access and share case and discovery files can also be significantly reduced.

It’s so important to have the right systems in place to enable efficient, ongoing management of your case data. Through the outsourcing of records and information management, your firm can enhance its capabilities in the most cost-effective manner.

Offsite document storage

The storage of case files and legal records can often get costly for companies, especially when done in-house. Improperly managed files can also hinder the support of ligation processes. Another concern is the inability to provide thorough disaster recovery to ensure that documents and files are protected from a range of threats. Professional records storage enables your legal records to be properly indexed, stored, tracked and managed for reliable and seamless access.

Document scanning

Digitizing your legal documents enables you to focus on cases and simultaneously reduce the amount of clerical work needed to do so. Electronic files can also be more easily shared than paper documents. Additionally, converting your legal records to a digital format allows for a reduction of the current overhead and administrative costs associated with managing a paper-dependent firm.

If your documents are already stored offsite in a records center, a scan on demand solution enables any files to be converted and securely delivered electronically. This can be especially advantageous for supporting time-sensitive litigation support requests. A full-service records and information management company can offer your firm a document scanning solution.

Data storage

Proper data protection also prepares your company for discovery requests. Because your company’s records retention inventory also includes electronic documents, it’s important first to properly preserve this data and then have the ability to quickly locate and retrieve it in support of litigation processes. Digital data stored on backup media should be stored offsite in an environment that fosters long-term preservation and protection.

A professionally managed media vault offers a repository for safeguarding your electronic data. In addition to providing a climate-controlled environment specific to the preservation of magnetic and optical media, it also offers the following systems to ensure continuous protection of your firm’s data:

While stored within a media vault, your electronic data is also tracked with barcode and inventory management technology, allowing for swift retrieval of legal information at any time to support litigation procedures.

Richards & Richards’ records and information management services provide law firms throughout Nashville with a solution for meeting their litigation support needs.

For more information, please contact us by phone or fill in the form on this page.

NASHVILLE, Tenn. – (Feb. 28, 2014) Richards & Richards CEO Steve Richards has been invited by NAID (National Association for Information Destruction) to speak at its annual national conference, to be held in Phoenix this April.

Richards, along with Eric Haas of Automated Record Management Systems in Green Bay, Wis., will lead a discussion records storage for destruction companies.

“Speaking at NAID is the equivalent of getting invited to perform at Carnegie Hall for someone in our business,” said Richards & Richards chief operations officer Jerre Richards. “This is a well-deserved honor for Steve and Eric.”

Steve Richards is also in the running for vice president of NAID. The election will be held at the conference.

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About Richards & Richards:

For more than 27 years, Richards & Richards has provided the highest level of professional records and information management services throughout Middle Tennessee. Focusing on traditional records management services, Richards & Richards offers records storage, data protection, secure paper shredding, magnetic media destruction, computer hard-drive destruction, e-vaulting, and copy and imaging services.

With more than 1,900 clients storing their records in its 251,000-square-foot records center, Richards & Richards is the oldest and largest single-market, independently owned and operated records management company in Tennessee.

Richards & Richards has a new DataVault - a FIRELOCK Class 125 Media Rated, Zone 4 seismic rated data protection facility and the only DataVault in Nashville that meets NFPA 75 and NFPA 232 standards for magnetic media.

Richards & Richards DataVault’s unique layout and ceramic fiber walls are designed not only to protect media from intense heat, but to reflect heat out, as well.

The walls are filled with a thick 8-inch layer of ceramic fiber, which can withstand 2000 degree heat for 5 hours. The temperature inside of the Richards & Richards DataVault will never rise above 125º F. (52º C) degrees during that time.

Below is a video that demonstrates just how effective just one inch of this fiber is:

More information about our new vault is available here.

Towards the end of each business day, you personally pop a backup cartridge into your tape drive, while doing a last check of emails and planning for the next day. When completed, the tape goes into your laptop bag so it can go home with you at the end of the day. You realize the importance of making sure that your data isn’t left on site after reading a disaster recovery article several years ago that made perfect sense.

You’re a control freak—and proud of it. You’ve gotten beyond trying to analyze why. In fact, you wear it with pride! After all, throughout the years it’s served you well—your firm control on daily operations and the ability to run a tight ship are the prime reasons your company is successful. You maintain hands-on involvement in virtually every area of your business, including the backup of your data.

Today on the way home, you stop at the dry cleaners—a routine you’ve followed hundreds of times. You run inside, pick up your laundry, and after a quick chat with store owner, you return to your car and place your clothes in the backseat. It isn’t until you’re halfway home that you notice your briefcase isn’t in its usual place on the passenger seat. You feel sick to your stomach.

It’s an instance where being a control freak may have cost you a lot more than your pride, but at least you can take solace in the fact that you’re not alone. According to the Ponemon Institute’s “2013 Cost of a Data Breach” study, negligence alone accounts for 33% of corporate data loss. So how could you have avoided this situation in the first place and maintained even more control over your data?

Acknowledging the risks of your current data protection strategy

The problem with taking a backup tape or hard drive home is the exposure to risk. In addition to the possibility of theft, there are other factors that can contribute to data loss. First, a private residence does not provide any more protection than leaving it within your office. While it may bring you peace of mind knowing that your backup tape is in the same building as you, it fails to acknowledge the probability, however slim, of a natural disaster or fire and flooding within your home. Your house simply does not provide the proper data protection environment.

The chances are even higher of the data written to your tape or hard drive being compromised from temperature and humidity conditions within your home or car. Given the climate fluctuations in our Nashville region, this is a very real possibility. Leave a tape in a hot car or humid room and your backup data could be gone for good.

Additionally, this purely manual process does not offer verifiable and controlled processes for managing your critical data. One mislabeled or improperly rotated tape can equally lead an audit nightmare—not to mention legal and regulatory problems. In order to ensure complete disaster recovery and business continuity capabilities, it’s important to be able to locate the exact critical data you need in the least amount of time.

Taking advantage of a professional data protection solution

A professional data protection solution can actually provide you with greater control of your data through the application of a professionally managed, off-site data storage and media rotation solution. Theft and disaster risks are significantly minimized by transporting backup media to a vault specially designed for the long-term protection and preservation of media assets and equipped with the following:

Tapes and hard drives containing vital data can be rotated and managed by professional data protection specialists, thus ensuring maximum recovery time objectives (RTOs) at all times. Barcode tracking interfaced with an inventory management system allows for a comprehensive audit trail of all media assets stored offsite.

Richards & Richards provides data protection solutions to businesses throughout Nashville. To find out more, please contact us by phone or fill in the form on this page.