Symantec wants to secure your memories

SYDNEY, Australia--Symantec is looking to use technologies acquired from Veritas Software to provide an Internet-based service through which consumers can automatically back up and remotely access important files such as digital photographs.

At a conference here Monday, Symantec's chief technology officer, Mark Bregman, said the security giant is looking at how it would be able to combine the technologies gained from its merger with Veritas to provide new services for consumers, small businesses and large enterprises.

Mark Bregman
CTO, Symantec

According to Bregman, much of the information stored on consumer PCs is unimportant or can be retrieved from other sources, but the driver behind online backup systems is ensuring that in case of disaster, consumers do not lose valued items such as digital photographs.

"People are suddenly realizing that they have their whole family history and family photo albums on their PC and nowhere else. If they lose them, they can never get them back--they can't go and take the pictures again because the kids have already grown up," Bregman said.

Bregman agreed that a large number of companies are already offering free online photo albums and backup services, but he said the nature of the free services means that the availability of the photos and other files is not guaranteed.

"They don't have any contractual obligations or even the technological capability to assure you that (the files) will continue to be there. So someday, they may not be there, and you will say, 'My god, what happened?', and they will say, 'We never said we would keep them forever'," Bregman said.

The other issue, according to Bregman, is that these sites require the user to "do something," such as manually upload the pictures to the Web site. The kind of service he said Symantec is looking at would automatically upload pictures from a PC and guarantee their future.

"We are talking about how to create a system where, by the nature of my having put (the files) on my machine, they are protected," Bregman said.

Munir Kotadia of ZDNet Australia reported from Sydney.

right on!

BackupExec dreamed of opening up their APIs for online backup. I suggest upselling some free backup hosting with secure VPN access and related geographical performance services. I have been working on linux with EVMS and some crypto device mappers and I am pretty impressed. Encrypted iSCSI mounts in a VPN is certainly the way to go as far as I can see.

Good Idea!

This is an excellent idea. I do this kind of thing over the network in my own home now, but what if my house were to burn down? I would be in trouble. The online photo stores that let you store your photo's online do not necessarily let you retrieve the full size file from there site, in most cases you can only see a thumbnail. That is not the type of backup I would want to rely on. I would purchase this service in a second when it comes avaiable.

[My-Self]

Online forever ...

Ok, that's nothing but a way to make sure people will stay hooked on Symantec subscription model not only for virus updates, but also for their family album ...<br /><br />Clever ripoff.

[Stating]

Cheaper Alternative

I looked at Veritas pricing for online backup and it was quite expensive for just a few hundred megs of backup. If you don't already own one, buy yourself a DVD burner (dual layers are now down to $60), some blank media, and drag and drop your photos and other important files to the drive. Take the media out and store it in your car trunk, a relative's house, or better yet, a safe deposit box. Do this once a month and you'll have reasonably good protection for a lot less than what Symantec will charge you.

[markdoiron]

You're Right Keith, But . . .

...the problem is so many folks don't actually do this. if one has a broadband connection and back-up requires only that the computer be left on, this could be very useful for the 99% of folks who never back up anything. as i say in another post, i think this could best be done through the isp's. buy the software (one time purchase fee; i'm not renting software!), then allocate some of the isp's hard drive space for this purpose for no add'l charge (ie, i have 1-gb of storage authorized on my account; let me designate 500-meg's for online back-up, 250-meg's for website, and 250-meg's for e-mail acct's.). finally, for a very modest price (i'd pay $5 for 20-gig's), offer more space. <br /><br />even though i do as you suggest, i'd appreciate the convenience of not having to manually feed the computer dvd's for several hours, and not having to swap the dvd's at the credit union safe deposit box. i'd also sleep easier knowing that my off-site storage is done automatically every night, rather than monthly (or even less frequently). <br /><br />mark d.

[markdoiron]

How I'd Buy This Service . . .

obviously Symantec is in this for the money. i do back up my computer to dvd regularly, and store those disks in a safe deposit box at my bank (which an f-5 tornado missed a couple years back by only a couple hundred yards!). but, i might be willing to buy this service if it was modestly priced for many gigs of storage, and if it were pain-free (automatic) to run. i think the best way to implement this is through isp's, who could offer "free" storage as a part of a standard subscription fee, then offer add'l gig's for a modest price (i wouldn't spend more than about $5/month and i currently back-up 20-gig's of data, exclusive of os/applications). <br /><br />mark d.

[HEDBlegg]

I hope this thread is active as I have 10 disks with photos on them that were backed up to the cd by Veritas Simple Picture back up now I want to access them I cant as the program is not compatable with my current system,Windows XP and on laptop Vista. Does anyone have any suggestions how I could access the disks, I thought the photos would be available if I backed them up to disk in 2004, the Veritas program came pre installed on the computer I was using. <br />Thank you HEDB