Some anecdotes on data loss in the cloud:
- online backup provider loses data, sues systems provider
- Nokia’s Ovi service loses user contacts and images
- ma.gnolia lost all user data
A more complex case, where the provider did (mostly?) the right thing:
These are not necessarily straightforward; each failure has disparate causes (too much reliance on expensive hardware in the first case; too little, perhaps, in the ma.gnolia case). But understanding what happens and when here is important as more and more of our data moves cloud-ward.
See also http://archiveteam.org/ … they’re tracking site closures and helping archive data at the last minute, if necessary.