Frequently Asked Questions

FAQs

Review common questions and clarifications to better understand how our data archiving solution works and where it adds value.

How can Infobelt reduce application retirement costs?

Infobelt reduces the high costs associated with application retirement by providing a structured framework to decommission legacy systems while maintaining secure, compliant access to historical data.

Below are the primary ways Infobelt’s solutions, specifically the Omni Archive Manager (OAM) and Application Retirement System (ARS), lower these expenses:

1. Elimination of Recurring Operational Expenses

The most immediate cost reduction comes from decommissioning aging systems that are no longer in regular use but still strain organizational resources. By retiring these applications, businesses can eliminate:

Licensing and Maintenance Fees: Ongoing payments to software vendors for legacy systems.
Infrastructure Costs: The hardware and data center resources required to keep old applications running.
Operational Support: The labor costs associated with IT staff maintaining and troubleshooting obsolete platforms.

2. Storage Optimization and Tiering

Infobelt optimizes how and where data is stored to minimize ongoing infrastructure spend:

High Compression Rates: Infobelt can compress structured data by up to 90% and unstructured data by up to 50%, significantly reducing the physical storage footprint.
Storage Tiering: The platform supports many connectors to multiple cost tiers across on-premises, cloud, or hybrid environments, allowing organizations to move data to the most cost-effective storage medium.
Down-tiering: Organizations can move least-used data from expensive OLTP data stores to “near line” storage, freeing up processing power and reducing the cost of production databases.

3. Consolidating Siloed Systems

Many organizations maintain multiple siloed solutions for different types of data (e.g., one for trading data, one for HR, another for marketing). Infobelt allows firms to centralize all regulated data onto one platform, reducing the complexity and cost of managing multiple disparate systems.

4. Defensible Destruction and Lifecycle Management

Infobelt reduces costs by ensuring that organizations only store what is strictly necessary:

Automated Disposition: The system identifies and removes data that has reached the end of its required lifecycle.
Policy Enforcement: By automatically deleting data at the end of its life, organizations avoid the “infinite storage” trap and the associated costs and risks.

5. Predictable and Flexible Pricing

Infobelt offers a SaaS-based model that allows organizations to retire and decommission legacy applications at a low, fixed monthly cost. For specific environments like SAP, Infobelt Essentials provides a certified way to save both time and money during major transitions, such as upgrading from SAP ECC to SAP S/4HANA.

How does data compression impact overall storage savings?

Data compression within Infobelt’s archiving solutions plays a critical role in reducing the physical footprint of information, leading to significant savings in storage space and overall infrastructure costs.

The impact of compression is measured by the type of data being archived:

Structured Data: Infobelt can achieve compression rates of up to 90% for structured data.
Unstructured Data: For unstructured data, such as documents and files, the system can reduce storage requirements by up to 50%.

Beyond simple space reduction, data compression impacts the enterprise in several strategic ways:

Optimized Infrastructure: By reducing the volume of data, organizations can better manage data growth and limit data exposure, which lowers the costs associated with maintaining extensive storage environments.
Automated Lifecycle Management: Compression is integrated directly into the archiving workflow. As the system acquires data, it simultaneously archives, verifies, compresses, and encrypts the information to ensure it is stored as efficiently as possible.
Cost-Effective Tiering: Compression works in tandem with storage tiering. By shrinking the data footprint before moving it to various cost tiers (on-premises or cloud), businesses maximize the value of their chosen storage medium.
Improved System Performance: Reducing data volume in primary environments (such as production databases) through archiving and compression improves the availability and performance of critical systems.

In summary, compression allows Infobelt to handle trillions of records and multi-petabyte datasets while keeping storage requirements—and their associated expenses—at a manageable and cost-effective level.

Can you explain the cost benefits of defensible destruction?

Defensible destruction is the structured, policy-driven process of identifying and permanently removing data that has reached the end of its required lifecycle and is no longer subject to legal holds. Within the Infobelt ecosystem, particularly through the Omni Archive Manager (OAM), this process provides several critical cost and risk-related benefits:

1. Reduced Storage and Infrastructure Costs

The most direct cost benefit is the elimination of storage expenses for data that is no longer needed. By automatically deleting data at the end of its life, organizations can:

Limit Data Growth: Prevent the “infinite storage” trap where aging data continuously strains data center resources and infrastructure.
Optimize Resources: Free up processing power and space in production databases and expensive primary storage tiers.

2. Mitigation of Legal and Regulatory Liability

Retaining legacy data longer than required is not just expensive; it is a significant business risk. Defensible destruction helps reduce liability by ensuring that information is not available to be discovered in future legal proceedings if its retention period has expired.

Compliance with Mandates: It ensures adherence to global standards such as SEC, FINRA, and GDPR, which require strict management of data lifecycles.
Reduced Risk Exposure: Systematically removing old data limits the amount of sensitive information that could be compromised during a security breach or ransomware attack.

3. Operational Efficiency and Automated Governance

Infobelt provides a destruction framework that replaces manual, error-prone processes with automated workflows.

Stakeholder Alignment: The disposition workflow involves legal stakeholders, record owners, and compliance officers to ensure every deletion is authorized and documented.
Audit Readiness: The system generates detailed disposition reports that identify exactly what was destroyed and why, allowing organizations to respond to auditors or regulators in minutes with verifiable data.

4. Streamlined Discovery and Audits

A smaller, better-governed data footprint is significantly cheaper to search. By performing defensible destruction, organizations can accelerate audits and legal discovery processes.

Faster Retrieval: With less “noise” in the archive, e-discovery tools can locate relevant records more efficiently for inspections or litigation.
Lower e-Discovery Costs: Reducing the volume of data that must be processed during legal holds directly lowers the costs associated with legal reviews and discovery.

What kind of reports are generated after data is destroyed?

Infobelt’s Omni Archive Manager (OAM) ensures that the process of defensible destruction is fully documented through specialized reporting and audit trails.

The following types of reports and documentation are generated to verify data destruction:

Disposition Reports: The system’s disposition workflow automatically generates reports that provide associated details for destroyed records, such as the specific object, project, and domain.
Graphical Activity Reports: Users can view graphical representations of all archiving activities, which include dedicated destruction reports along with summaries of users, activities, objects, and events.
Audit Trails and Chain-of-Custody: OAM maintains full audit trails and complete chain-of-custody tracking for all data operations, ensuring the integrity and defensibility of the destruction process.
Verifiable Compliance Data: These reports allow organizations to provide verifiable data to regulators and auditors in minutes, proving that data was destroyed according to established retention policies.
Administrative Audits: The platform also generates reports to audit administrator changes, providing oversight on who approved or initiated destruction tasks.

These reporting capabilities are part of a broader destruction framework that involves stakeholders—including legal teams, record owners, and compliance officers—to ensure every deletion is authorized and documented for regulatory purposes.

How does Infobelt manage legal holds for specific records?

Infobelt manages legal holds through a centralized, automated governance framework within the Omni Archive Manager (OAM) that ensures critical data is preserved during litigation or audits.

How are legal holds applied within the system?

Infobelt provides highly granular control over how holds are implemented. Organizations can apply legal holds at the business unit level, the project or application level, or at the individual record level. This flexibility allows legal teams to target only the specific data relevant to a matter rather than freezing entire databases unnecessarily.

Who can manage these holds?

The system uses fine-grained role management to delegate authority. Organizations can create specific governance roles based on professional responsibilities, empowering authorized users to perform tasks such as placing or removing holds and approving dispositions. This ensures a clear separation of duties and a secure chain of custody for all regulated information.

How do legal holds interact with data destruction?

Legal holds act as a primary safeguard within Infobelt’s defensible disposition framework. The system prevents the deletion of any record that is currently flagged with a hold status, even if that record has reached the end of its standard retention period. The destruction workflow includes dedicated filters for reviewing, marking for transfer, and removing holds to ensure no data is destroyed prematurely.

Can users search for records based on their hold status?

Yes. Infobelt’s comprehensive search capabilities allow users to perform searches based specifically on record-hold status. This feature enables legal and compliance teams to quickly identify and report on all data currently protected by a hold, streamlining the e-discovery and audit processes.

How is the integrity of held data maintained?

To satisfy stringent regulatory mandates, such as SEC 17a-4 and FINRA, Infobelt stores archived records in a read-only, tamper-proof format. By utilizing WORM (Write Once Read Many) storage, the system ensures that once a legal hold is in place, the data remains physically immutable, rendering it protected from unauthorized changes or rogue encryption attempts.

How does OAM secure data against ransomware attacks?

Infobelt’s Omni Archive Manager (OAM) secures archived information against ransomware through a multi-layered defense strategy focused on data immutability and architectural isolation.

The primary methods OAM uses to protect against ransomware include:

WORM (Write Once Read Many) Storage: OAM utilizes WORM storage to make data physically immutable. This renders ransomware attacks ineffective because the data is stored in a read-only, tamper-proof format, preventing the “rogue encryption” typically used by attackers to lock records.
Advanced Secure Zones: The platform separates retired and infrequently used data into a dedicated secure zone. This zone is protected by “air gap” and “zero trust” security models to limit exposure to the broader network.
Fine-Grained Entitlements: OAM manages access through user and group-level entitlements, ensuring that only authorized personnel can interact with specific datasets. Role-based management further organizes responsibilities, such as placing holds or approving dispositions, to prevent unauthorized system changes.
Comprehensive Audit Trails: Every operation performed on archived data is captured in detailed activity audit trails. This provides a complete chain-of-custody and allows organizations to monitor for any suspicious activity.
Archive Encryption: Beyond physical immutability, data is encrypted during the archiving process and managed securely with encryption tools and password protection.
Future Blockchain Integration: To further enhance security, Infobelt plans to enable OAM to store and retrieve data from various blockchains in the near future.

How are user entitlements managed to ensure secure data access?

Infobelt ensures secure data access through a multi-layered governance framework that leverages existing corporate infrastructure and fine-grained internal controls.

According to the sources, user entitlements are managed through the following mechanisms:

1. Identity and Access Management (IAM) Integration

Infobelt’s platform and processes are designed to leverage an organization’s existing IAM solutions. This allows for the seamless integration of established user and group access protocols, ensuring that data protection remains consistent with the organization’s broader security standards.

2. Fine-Grained Entitlements

Access is governed by user and group-level fine-grained entitlements. This high level of granularity allows administrators to define precisely which users can interact with specific datasets or system components, minimizing the risk of unauthorized data exposure.

3. Role-Based Access Control (RBAC)

The Omni Archive Manager (OAM) organizes users by assigning roles based on their specific organizational responsibilities. These roles include:

Governance Roles: For users responsible for sensitive tasks such as placing or removing legal holds and approving defensible dispositions.
Operations Roles: For technical personnel tasked with onboarding data and scheduling archives.
Read-Only Roles: For users who need to view audit logs or run reports without the ability to modify system configurations or data.

4. Secure Retrieval and Sensitive Data Masking

In addition to managing who can access the data, Infobelt employs technical controls to protect the data during retrieval. This includes sensitive data masking, password protection, and the use of encryption tools to manage information securely. Systems like AQL Copilot further enhance security by maintaining a complete history of prompts and responses, which provides oversight of how users are interacting with archived data.

5. Compliance and Audit Oversight

To ensure accountability, all operations involving archived data are captured in detailed activity audit trails. Administrators can audit changes and view graphical reports of all user activities, ensuring that data access remains compliant with regulatory mandates such as SEC, FINRA, and HIPAA.

Explain the integration between existing IAM solutions and Infobelt’s platform.

Infobelt’s platform is designed to leverage an organization’s existing Identity and Access Management (IAM) solutions to maintain a consistent security posture.

The integration works through the following mechanisms:

- Seamless User and Group Integration: The platform and its associated processes incorporate an organization’s established user and group access protocols. This ensures that existing entitlements are mirrored within the archiving environment, keeping data protected at all times.
- Fine-Grained Entitlements: By leveraging existing IAM data, Infobelt manages fine-grained entitlements at both the user and group levels. This allows for precise control over who can access specific datasets or perform sensitive system actions.
- Role-Based Access Control (RBAC): Users are organized into specific roles based on their organizational responsibilities. This policy-based access is a critical component for meeting corporate and regulatory compliance goals.
- Delegated Responsibilities: The integration enables the creation of specialized roles, such as:
  - Governance Roles: Authorized to perform critical compliance tasks like placing or removing legal holds and approving defensible data dispositions.
  - Operations Roles: Tasked with technical management, including onboarding data and scheduling archive jobs.
  - Read-Only Roles: Designed for users who only need to view audit logs or run reports without the ability to modify data or configurations.

This integration ensures that as users move through an organization or change departments within the primary IAM system, their access to the Infobelt archive is automatically governed by the same central authority.

How are legal hold reports used during regulatory audits?

Legal hold reports within the Omni Archive Manager (OAM) serve as critical evidence during regulatory audits by providing verifiable proof that an organization has complied with data preservation mandates. Drawing from the sources, here is how these reports are utilized:

1. Rapid Response and Verification

Legal hold reports allow organizations to respond to regulators and auditors in minutes rather than days or weeks. They provide verifiable data that demonstrates exactly which records were protected from deletion and for what duration. This real-time view of books and records tasks helps auditors quickly identify potential infractions or confirm continuous compliance.

2. Targeted Data Retrieval

Auditors often require specific subsets of data related to a particular investigation. OAM facilitates this through:

Status-Based Search: Users can perform comprehensive searches specifically based on record-hold status.
Efficient Reporting: Once relevant records are identified, the system enables users to pull out data easily and prepare reports efficiently to satisfy the audit’s scope.
Semantic Accuracy: Advanced e-discovery tools and semantic search further enhance this process by matching auditor queries to related concepts (e.g., matching “financial reports” to specific archived sets), ensuring no relevant “held” data is missed.

3. Demonstrating Chain-of-Custody and Integrity

A primary concern for auditors is whether archived data is authentic and tamper-proof. Legal hold reports support this by:

Full Audit Trails: Reports provide a complete chain-of-custody tracking and detailed activity logs for every operation performed on the data.
Immutability Proof: They verify that records remained in a read-only, tamper-proof format (WORM storage) while the hold was active, eliminating concerns about rogue encryption or unauthorized changes.

4. Documenting the Disposition Lifecycle

If data was destroyed after a hold was lifted, the disposition workflow generates specific reports to justify that action. These reports include:

Associated Details: Documentation of the object, project, and domain associated with the records.
Administrative Oversight: Evidence that the destruction followed a framework involving legal stakeholders and compliance officers, ensuring the deletion was authorized and defensible.
Visual Summaries: Graphical representations of all archiving and destruction activities, which provide auditors with a holistic view of the organization’s data governance health.