Briefs

InternetNews.com (03/05/07) Boulton, Clint

Information management technology will need to improve in order to handle the enormous increase in digital information in the years to come, according to IDC chief research officer John Gantz. A new IDC report predicts that digital information will increase sixfold from 161 billion GB last year to 988 billion GB by 2010. Businesses will need to use more advanced techniques for transporting, storing, securing, and replicating the information, says Gantz. "You can't treat all data, all packets, and all bytes the same," he says. "That's where you get into interesting situations of classifying data and determining what you save and what you don't." The Internet, which has grown from 48 million users in 1996 to 1.1 billion users in 2006, is a key reason for the proliferation of digital information, and IDC expects another 500 million users will be online by 2010. The largest number of bytes, more than 500 billion, will be from images taken from digital cameras, camera phones, medical scanners, and security cameras. Individuals will generate close to 70 percent of the information, and most of it will reach businesses.