Important considerations concerning SITAD in rush to Cloud

With an increasing amount of physical data being migrated to cloud storage, the need for secure IT asset disposition (Secure ITAD) is more important than ever. Secure ITAD represents a burgeoning, worldwide industry surrounding the safe and secure reuse, recycling or remarketing of physical IT assets after they reach the end of their life in an organization.

Many businesses have already migrated vital data to the cloud, and many more are spending a good amount of time and money crafting detailed cloud migration plans. However, many of these plans continue to fall short regarding how the organization disposes of any remaining, legacy gear left behind — like individual servers, storage systems, backup tape or, even, whole data centers.

Why should asset disposition be included in a cloud migration plan? Here are a few reasons that could either help or hinder an organization's bottom line: In many cases, the potential exists to resell the legacy gear, thereby providing some value back to the IT group. In other cases, however, the risk exists that such legacy hardware could still retain sensitive data that might end up in the wrong hands if not properly decommissioned, recycled or destroyed.

Cloud backup: don't forget to give tape a proper send-off

One of the most popular, early use cases for cloud migration is associated with cloud backup and disaster recovery. Yet, many organizations struggle with how best to make such a move, especially when faced with a mountain of legacy backup tape.

According to an IDG Research report, as much as 79% of large enterprise businesses surveyed noted that they were somewhat likely to move their legacy data from tape to the cloud. Many of them expressed concern, however, about how best to go about it. Some might choose to complete this migration in phases, and allow their tape vaulting provider to help them manage the migration. Others may use their vaulting provider to help them manage the ongoing tape restoration still needed during a multi-phase migration.

Whichever way organizations choose to move forward, the fact remains that such legacy tape still needs secure asset disposition at some point after the migration is completed. Some advice for finding the right ITAD provider includes the need to look for auditable workflows, adherence to security best practices, secure oversight of partners, environmental safety guarantees and proof or certification of destruction.

Resources for device decommissioning

While many cloud migration plans fall short for asset disposition planning, some good examples exist on the internet. These are often couched in terms like "device decommissioning," "system decommissioning" or "system retirement."

One of the most comprehensive examples is found within the Procurement Division of the California Department of General Services (DGS). This group has a number of cloud computing resources to aid state agencies and departments that are moving to cloud. One such resource is the Cloud Assessment and Migration Service Template, which outlines a detailed, five-phase migration plan with "Decommissioning" as the fifth phase of the plan. The decommissioning/disposition process is broken into subtasks that include decommissioning any affected services, applications and data center assets, as well as the disposition of whole facilities, if needed.

Other good resources for reference include a seven-phase data migration checklist at Data Migration Pro. Decommissioning tasks are described throughout, as well as in the final phase, "Decommission & Monitor." The University of Nebraska-Lincoln also offers a useful and detailed Decommissioning Process Guide.

Nailing down the before-and-after details

Organizations wanting to follow best practices for regulatory compliance, governance and IT security may benefit from third-party expertise to help them complete the lifecycle of data and systems, including IT asset disposition. For the before-and-after details surrounding cloud migration projects and ITAD, look for expert providers who can speak to all aspects of the data lifecycle — from ongoing data management to cloud data migration, cloud backup and final IT asset disposition.

According to a 2016 survey, 59% of respondents back up to tape while a growing number (41%) now back up their data to the cloud.