Fujifilm Touts Tape Monitoring Service

Fujifilm has added more flesh to the bones of its strategy for monitoring tapes in transit, adapting technology for finding stolen cars to its Tape Tracker service.

The vendor first demonstrated the technology at last year's SC07 show, touting the ability to track tapes via GPS.

"We're talking about an add-on to your security policy where your tapes don't leave the building without a Tape Tracker," says Dan Greenberg, new product manager at Fujifilm's recording media division. "This gives the chief security officer and the data center manager peace of mind that their tapes are being protected as they move outside of their environment."

Now generally available, Fujifilm is selling the Tape Tracker service through its resellers, priced at around $150 a month, and the company has revealed more details of its core technology.

The solution's hardware component, which was developed by Fujifilm and cargo tracking specialist SC-Integrity is essentially a tape cartridge with the tape removed and replaced with a GPS receiver and cellular transmitter. This fits into a carrying case alongside other 'real' cartridges and can be tracked by users via a Web application called Fujifind.Fujifind is based on SC-Integrity's LoJack Intransit software, the earliest version of which was used for locating stolen cars.

When IT managers log onto the Fujifind Website using a secure user ID and password, the software compiles GPS data from the Tape Tracker hardware to create a real-time 'map' of where the tapes are located.

The software can also notify users when the tapes enter specific pre-defined locations such as a data center, off-site vault, or disaster recovery site, something that could be useful when dealing with third party DR firms such as Iron Mountain.

"There's also an extensive reporting feature on there where you can create 'chain of custody' reports and pull up specific date ranges for specific Tape Trackers," says Greenberg.

Although branded as a Fujifilm offering, Tape Tracker is actually run as a managed service from SC-Integrity's monitoring center in Texas. Initially, Fujifilm had looked to U.K. defense specialist QinetiQ as its tape-tracking partner, although Fujifilm was eventually won over by SC-Integrity's service capabilities."It was a tough choice in terms of technology, but the service aspect made us go for SC-Integrity -- they have 24/7 365-day customer service and technical support," says Rich Gadomski, Fujifilm's vice president of marketing.

The vendor also told Byte and Switch that around 20 companies are currently beta testing the Tape Tracker service, but refused to reveal their identities.

Fujifilm is not the first vendor to turn its attention to tape tracking, although other efforts in this space have focused largely on Radio Frequency Identification (RFID)-based tracking. HP, for example, used RFID tags to monitor data center kit as part of a trial at Michigan-based retailer Meijer.

Removable media specialist Imation has also thrown its weight behind RFID, unveiling a tape-tracking solution last year.

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