Data Recovery

Data recovery is the process of restoring data that has been lost, accidentally deleted, corrupted or made inaccessible. In enterprise IT, data recovery typically refers to the restoration of data to a desktop, laptop, server or external storage system from a backup. In the general data recovery category, a few different types of techniques are applied to specific scenarios. Hardware data recovery techniques work on situations where a system failure prevents easy access to a hard drive. With more sophisticated hardware, this problem is easily solved. Another type of data recovery technique applies to disk level failure, where more elaborate approaches may be required. Other types of data recovery pertain to data that has been deleted and possibly overwritten, where data recovery involves specific manipulation of the bits recorded on a drive.
Most data loss is caused by human error, rather than malicious attacks, according to U.K. statistics released in 2016. In fact, human error accounted for almost two-thirds of the incidents reported to the U.K. Information Commissioner’s Office. The most common type of breach occurred when someone sent data to the wrong person.
Other common causes of data loss include power outages, natural disasters, equipment failures or malfunctions, accidental deletion of data, unintentionally formatting a hard drive, damaged hard drive read/write heads, software crashes, logical errors, firmware corruption, continued use of a computer after signs of failure, physical damage to hard drives, laptop theft, and spilling coffee or water on a computer.