You may be in favor of maintaining a specific data retention policy rather than keeping data forever, but it can be tricky getting business units to cooperate. First you have to persuade them to let you know how long their data should be kept, and, as analyst George Crump puts it, "herding cats may be an easier task." Some will want to keep their data forever, and others will have vague guidelines for getting rid of it.

"The odds of you properly categorizing all the data in all its forms into the right retention windows are stacked against you," Crump writes in a post at InformationWeek. "The man hours to properly identify up front and as an ongoing bases all the data which is being created in your enterprise, and then to properly move that data into the right retention buckets at just the right time are going to be staggering."

Even if you are able to deploy a good data retention strategy, it isn't foolproof because employees may find ways to hold on to data after it has been officially deleted. "You have to assume if the data was going to hurt the organization it is going to get out somehow," writes Crump, who is an analyst with Storage Switzerland. The safest bet may be to keep data forever, and that way the organization will at least have it on hand if it needs it to defend itself, he advises.

For more:
- see George Crump's post at InformationWeek

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