Organisations that fail to take data seriously are not only risking the safety of their customers’ most sensitive information, but also gambling with their own business reputation. Matt Bryars, CEO of Aeriandi discusses the importance of data storage, archive and retrieval solutions and why the cloud may hold the answers businesses are looking for.
There are many reasons why organisations record their customer and business calls. Whether for training purposes, compliance adherence or other business processes, the volume of call recordings being generated today is growing at an exponential rate. However, with each recording made comes important questions that need to be addressed, such as:
- Does the recording contain sensitive customer information (including payment information)?
- How can it be stored in a secure, compliant manner?
- Is it easily accessible should retrieval and playback be required?
- Is there an audit trail of access for compliance purposes?
Historically, the route that most organisations would have gone down for their call storage and archiving was an in-house archive solution. This typically involved recording calls onto tapes or SAN disks and housing them in a physical archive on-site. However, as the volume of frecordings grows and businesses become increasingly global in size, many are finding in-house solutions can no longer satisfy the questions posed above. As a result, many are beginning to look for more efficient, secure and flexible solutions in the cloud.
What are the benefits of call archiving in the cloud?
Cloud archive solutions offer a host of advantages over in-house solutions, ranging from compliance guarantees to centralisation of records. Below are some of the key benefits explained in more detail:
Centralisation – Rather than having call recordings archived locally across multiple disparate sites around the world, data is centralised in one, cloud-based location. As a result, all call recordings can be accessed via a single online portal from anywhere, by anyone with the correct authentication.
Preservation – Many organisations have accrued hundreds of terabytes of call recordings over the years. In a high number of instances, these calls are stored on backup tapes, which are prone to deterioration over time. But by transferring these recordings to a centralised cloud location, any concerns relating to tape decay or playback are immediately eliminated.
Security – All call recordings stored in the cloud are encrypted right at the start of their transference to the archive platform, maximising their security protection. Furthermore, the access keys themselves are also encrypted, so that the service provider cannot access the recordings within the platform or when they are played back.
Organisation – Without highly detailed, ongoing cataloguing, tape archives can quickly become black holes for individual call recordings. However, when uploading to a cloud-based archive, all original metadata is retained, allowing it to be catalogued based on factors including site, business unit, telephone number etc. making retrieval and playback far simpler.
Compliance – A significant factor behind any secure call recording and archiving is that of compliance, whether it be the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS), the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) or any number of other compliance standards. Maintaining ongoing compliance with in-house solutions can be a laborious and costly exercise. However, cloud archiving service providers include compliance guarantees in all of their archiving solutions, taking a significant weight off the organisation and providing peace of mind that compliance is taken care off.
What should businesses look for in a cloud partner?
When choosing potential cloud partners, there are several key factors that should be examined closely before making a final decision:
- Are they on the VISA Global Register of Service Providers?All providers on this list have been audited by VISA and their compliance solutions meet VISAs high standards.
- Where and how do they store their data?What kind of cloud environment is it, is it encrypted, does the service provider have access to it and who ultimately owns it?
- How scalable is their cloud?Are they able to offer the scalability required both now and in the future? If not, there could be problems down the road.
Not only do cloud solutions eliminate all of the infrastructure costs associated with maintaining call recording archives on-site, but they also remove many of the compliance responsibilities from the organisation along with the associated costs. Furthermore, they give the organisation 24/7 support from experts and peace of mind that their sensitive data is secure and accessible at all times.
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