SSD technology highly adopted, but not infallible

According to a recent SSD technology use survey, Kroll Ontrack has revealed that while nearly 90 per cent of respondents leverage the performance and reliability benefits of SSD technology within their organisation, one-third confirmed they experienced some sort of SSD technology malfunction. Of those who did, 61 per cent lost data and fewer than 20 per cent were successful in recovering their data, reinforcing the known complexity of SSD data recovery.

In the UK, 27 per cent of respondents had experienced a failure of their SSD technology and of these 56 per cent experienced data loss as a result. A slightly higher number than the global figure (26 per cent) were able to recover their data following a failure.

“In the case of SSD technology, data resides in a more scattered format on the drive as compared to traditional hard drive media where data is stored more linearly, adding complexity to SSD data recovery scenarios,” said Paul Le Messurier, Programme and Operations Manager at Kroll Ontrack. “Further, although consolidation in the SSD industry is occurring, data layout and organisation on SSD mediums are still not standardised, driving the need for custom recovery solutions based on the specific manufacturer and model of the device. With strong investment in SSD research and development, Kroll Ontrack offers customers high SSD recovery success rates due to its vast experience with SSD technology and market-leading technologies.”

Data storage technology continues to trend toward SSD both on an enterprise and consumer level. Of the nearly 2,000 survey respondents, over three-quarters use SSD technology in laptop and/or mobile devices, 60 per cent in desktop computers and a growing 20 per cent in server environments. With the exponential growth of consumer and business data, it is not surprising the survey revealed that the strongest drivers toward SSD adoption are performance and speed, with nearly three-quarters of respondents citing fast data access as their main goal in selecting SSD over traditional hard drive technology. Only 10 per cent of SSD users cited the reliability and energy-saving properties of SSD technology over traditional hard drive technology as their primary considerations. Findings in the UK were broadly consistent with the global survey, apart from a higher number of respondents (15 per cent) who reported reliability and less energy consumption as their main reasons for using SSDs.

“The current and projected rate of data storage growth is astounding,” added Le Messurier. “SSD technology provides exceptional speed and performance benefits when managing and working within large data environments, and organisations are taking advantage. Despite the many benefits of SSD technology – including reliability – data loss continues to impact SSD devices, just like any other storage device. In fact, Kroll Ontrack has averaged over a 100 per cent increase in SSD recovery requests year over year from 2011 – 2014. With the industry’s most advanced set of solutions, Kroll Ontrack is a trusted partner for SSD recovery.”

With the growing adoption of SSD devices and data security at the forefront of present business concerns, it is critical that businesses take the proper precautions when disposing of failed devices. This is also true of early generation SSD devices that may be reaching end-of-life. Kroll Ontrack survey results indicate that the most popular disposal method taken by 43 per cent of respondents is to physically shred or destroy the drive (39 per cent in the UK). While this is an effective approach, the SSD cannot be reused. An alternate secure option is to follow the response of nearly 20 per cent of respondents and utilise professional data erasure software to ensure data is sanitised. Additionally, a professional erasure verification service can validate data erasure methods are effective and provide verification reporting – a smart step to take when repurposing or retiring SSD technology.