InstaPundit posts about this, together with an e-mail from a reader speculating why the server company may have just given FBI the whole servers:
I work in a huge company with a lot of rack-mounted servers.
We have no “documented process” that an Operator (or even Technician) could provide the contents of a server.
We have mainframe tape drives and remote backup systems, but they are all proprietary — and complicated to use.
It’s not like we can just burn a DL-DVD (or 10+) and provide a backup of the hundreds of gigs of data that a server holds. Not only do we not have the burner or the media, we also don’t have the procedures. If it’s not documented and approved, an Operator cannot perform the action on the production data. And only an Operator can perform tasks relating to production data — not Technicians.
It would be far, far easier to just shut down the boxes, pull them, and give them to the Feds. Two non-production servers could be re-assigned and automated restores queued. The process for swapping out failed servers (which is what this simulates) is documented and proceduralized.
That’s how we would handle it, if it ever came up.
I can’t say, though, whether this would be the standard operating procedure at most hosting companies.
Comments are closed.