ioSafe unveils ‘disaster-proof hardware’ for UK market

ioSafe this week unleashed its product family onto the UK market, giving us storage it claimed could survive any disaster.

The US firm targets its products at small and medium businesses (SMBs) or branch offices for larger firms, although some solutions fall into the consumer category.

It sells the devices through channel partners and has just signed an agreement with Micro-P to get distribution moving in the UK.

The idea behind the range is that it can withstand fire, flood or even theft

"Now is the right time to expand into the UK," Robb Moore, chief executive (CEO) of ioSafe, told IT Pro. "We have had lots of requests for our products over here and the UK is a fantastic marketplace."

"If you combine the UK's understanding of data storage and its care about security, it is the right move for us."

The idea behind the range is that it can withstand fire, flood or even theft thanks to built in physical protections to the hard drives and SSD-based technologies.

"Encryption and network security are often used to protect data," read a statement from ioSafe. "Wildfires and hurricanes care little about whether the data is encrypted [and] firefighters won't ask your permission before hosing down your entire computer system."

"Physical security of data is often overlooked. Nearly every business, large or small has vulnerabilities [and] ioSafe specialises in hardware to help protect vulnerable data wherever it may reside."

There are two main lines of storage products from ioSafe, the desktop range and the portable portfolio.

The Solo and SoloPro offerings come with either HDD or SSD and are both bulky, designed to be kept in-house. However, with this bulk comes resilience, as the company claims they can withstand 30 minutes of 1,550F heat or up to 72 hours under 10ft of water without losing data.

The Rugged Portable drives are more about the risks data faces on the move. Again with the choice of HDD or SSD, these products can survive the crush of up to 5,000lbs and a drop of 20ft whilst still retaining their data, claims ioSafe.

For more reassurance, ioSafe offers a one-year warranty alongside a one year data recovery service, which can be extended up to five years if paid for. The promise with these services is to get replacement hardware after a disaster occurs with all your original data restored to it.

"We have a 99.99 per cent success rate of keeping and retaining that data so it makes a big difference to businesses and people," added Moore.

"We have products shipping now and, although we are just getting started, we are really excited about expanding here in the UK."