Microsoft's Danger SideKick data loss casts dark on cloud computing
October 11th, 2009
Daniel Eran Dilger
Microsoft has demonstrated that the dark side of cloud computing has no silver linings. After a major server outage occurred on its watch last weekend, users dependent on the company have just been informed that their personal data and photos "has almost certainly been lost."
Microsoft's Danger SideKick data loss casts dark on cloud computing
While occasional service outages have hit nearly everyone in the business, knocking Google's Gmail off-line for hours, plunging RIM's BlackBerrys into the dark, or leaving Apple's MobileMe web apps unreachable to waves of users, Microsoft's high profile outage has impacted users in the worst possible way: the company has unrecoverably lost nearly all of its users' data, and now has no alternative backup plan for recovering any of it a week later.
The outage and data loss affects all SideKick customers of the Danger group Microsoft purchased in early 2008. Danger maintained a significant online services business for T-Mobile's SideKick users. All of T-Mobile's SideKick phone users rely on Danger's online service to supply applications such as contacts, calendars, IM and SMS, media player, and other features of the device, and to store the data associated with those applications.
When Microsoft's Danger servers began to fall off-line last Friday October 2, users across the country couldn't even use the services; even after functionality was beginning to be brought back on Tuesday October 6, users still didn't have their data back. This Saturday, after a week of efforts to solve the crisis, T-Mobile finally announced to its SideKick subscribers:
"Regrettably, based on Microsoft/Danger's latest recovery assessment of their systems, we must now inform you that personal information stored on your device - such as contacts, calendar entries, to-do lists or photos - that is no longer on your Sidekick almost certainly has been lost as a result of a server failure at Microsoft/Danger."
A new report from Engadget says that T-Mobile has suspended sales of its SideKick models and is warning: "Sidekick customers, during this service disruption, please DO NOT remove your battery, reset your Sidekick, or allow it to lose power."
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