Digital disaster management in libraries in India

Abstract

Purpose – Disaster management is an issue that has received relatively little attention in libraries, particularly in India. With the growth in digital resources in libraries, it is necessary for librarians to understand and apply the ways of protecting digital data and the related equipment from disaster. The purpose of this paper is to address the issues related to digital data protection in libraries in India. It aims to investigate the perceptions of librarians about the probability of digital disasters happening in their libraries, and to assess the level of digital disaster preparedness among libraries. Design/methodology/approach – A questionnaire based survey of 276 libraries in the Western region of India was conducted to find out the digital data protection measures taken by them. The paper provides an overview and analysis of the general trends in digital data protection in these libraries. Findings – The research results indicate that due to lack of knowledge about handling of digital data, and inadequate digital infrastructure setup in organizations, the chances of loss of digital data are high. However, common measures like taking backup of data manually are mostly followed by all libraries. The paper has identified the trends in protection of digital data, as well as the lacunae, in Indian libraries. Basic guidelines on digital data preservation are also presented in the paper. Practical implications – The guidelines provided in the paper will be useful to any libraries to take measures for protection of the digital data. The libraries will be able to prepare their digital data protection plan and train the staff accordingly. Originality/value – This paper is the first to address the issue of digital disaster management in libraries in India. It provides a detailed analysis of digital data protection measures taken by Indian libraries currently.

The State of Preparedness for Digital Curation and Preservation: A Case Study of a Developing Country Academic Library

“…Results showed that most digital disasters in the questionnaire were rated as 'highly likely' and 'likely' and the highest was the collapse of whole or part of the building (79%) followed by software and hardware malfunctions with 76%. This is in contrast to the findings of Zaveri (2015) in an investigation of digital disasters in India where the results of the study indicated that just over 50% of the librarians perceived less than 20% chance of digital disasters, while only 7.61% perceived a probability of over 60%. The results of Zaveri were, however, due to the fact that the proportion of digital resources were relatively low compared to print resources.…”

“…They relied mostly on donated machines. This is consistent with the results obtained by Zaveri (2015) who highlighted that libraries had not developed adequate IT infrastructure to support digital resources in India.…”

“…Other studies examined digital disaster preparedness as an essential component of preparedness for digital curation and preservation (Zaveri, 2015;Frank and Yakel, 2013;Jiazhen and Daoling, 2007). Frank and Yakel (2013) note that our understanding of disaster planning for digital collections remains limited, both in terms of what constitutes disaster planning activities as well as whether any best practices have emerged in planning for different types of risk.…”

Preventive and Curative Efforts in Archive Management Planning for the Threat of Natural Disasters in Indonesia

“…Disaster management cycle consisting of several stages, namely mitigation, preparedness, response and recovery (Zaveri, 2015), Mitigation (mitigation) is achieved with / taking a long-term preventive measure after analyzing the risks that may arise. Readiness (preparedness) is usually regarded as a step which allows organizations, communities and individuals to respond quickly and effectively to disaster situations that occur.…”

Mitigating and Dealing with Disasters: The Task of the Newly Employed Information Manager in Knowledge Preservation

“…This has been found to be the case in Western region of India where a recent survey by Zaveri (2015) on some 276 libraries to determine the kind of protection measures they had put in place to protect digital data found that most lacked knowledge about digital data handling and did not have adequate digital infrastructure setup, and that chances of losing digital data in these organizations was high. Zaveri (2015) found that all these libraries relied on manual data backup for their digital materials. This is in spite that digital data preservation is a key aspect of all research projects, as some research data are unique and cannot be replaced if destroyed or lost, yet research is only judged as sound if it contains references with verifiable data.…”