"Digital black hole" threatens your documents

The EU is funding a project involving national libraries and digital preservation groups aimed at fighting off a looming "digital black hole".

The black hole in question is the potential future loss of data as file formats become obsolete and inaccessible.

The Planets (Preservation and Long-term Access project through Networked Services) consortium will develop a "sustainable framework" to maintain access to digital content after its original storage format has disappeared.

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It is estimated that five billion documents are produced every year within the EU, of which two per cent - 100 million - are seen as worth archiving. Two million of these documents are on formats at risk from disappearing into the digital black hole

The consortium includes national libraries, archives, research institutes and technology specialists across Europe. The UK organisations taking part are the British Library and Cambridge-based Microsoft Research Limited.

The EU's Information Society Technologies R&D programme is providing €8.6m of the €14m required to fund the project.

Adam Farquhar, head of e-architecture at the British Library, said that as past and current computer hardware and software become obsolete, digital information reliant on this technology becomes increasingly hard to find, view, search and re-use.

"There is a growing consensus on the need to act now to avoid a gaping hole in our cultural and scientific record," he said.

Lynne Brindley, chief executive of the British Library, said European libraries and archives are uniquely positioned to lead this digital preservation initiative, as they have the legal responsibility and the legislative framework to safeguard digital information.