Traditionally, oil has been the metaphor of choice when discussing the value of data. Like oil, data has been considered a coveted resource that governs the modern world. This is why organizations around the globe preserve vast stores of data even when it has no immediate value. Companies hold onto the asset with the belief that they will call upon it at some point in the future.

But alas, this comparison has become a poor fit in recent times. Data has become risky, expensive to store, hard to extract value from, and a desirable target for adversaries. More businesses are now realizing that data banks bear more in common with the valuable, although hard to extract value from, and dangerous, uranium.

For decades, businesses have been using data for growth. Today, the importance of utilizing data to gain insights into customer behavior, market trends and business performance continues to develop. However, harnessing the power of data requires more than just the right tools and technology -- it also requires the right talent.

Technological developments, such as artificial intelligence (AI) and the Internet of Things (IoT), have resulted in data and data analysis providing increasing opportunities for businesses to improve their competitive edge. Data is a valuable resource in all sectors, but it is only useful if it is analyzed, interpreted and applied correctly -- this is where talented individuals with an understanding of data science and analytics come in.

Data is still essential for enterprises, but the rise of hybrid working and the adoption of multi-cloud environments has made data mobility and migration a hot topic.

We spoke to Mark Greenlaw, VP of product strategy for Cirrus Data, to discuss data mobility, what's driving it and how organizations need to adapt.

Cloud spending is now a critical KPI for the majority of data teams, according to a new report. Almost 80 percent of business stakeholders say cloud spending is a critical KPI while 55 percent of data practitioners say the same.

The study, from data observability platform Unravel Data, surveyed 350 data professionals at the Data Teams Summit event earlier this year and shows that in addition to cloud spending being elevated as a top KPI, 44 percent report that they believe that they are leaving money on the table when it comes to their public cloud utilization.

Backups have been an essential part of IT since the days of paper tape and punched cards, but nobody ever said they were exciting.

Of all the things that now have a day devoted to them, backups probably deserve one more than most for being the unsung savior of many an information professional's career. On today's World Backup Day we've asked some experts to tell us their views on backups and why they are still vital.

Shadow data is named as the number one concern around protecting cloud data by 68 percent of data security professionals.

A new study from Laminar reveals that the number of respondents expressing concern over shadow data has increased to 93 percent compared to 82 percent the year before.

The past few years have seen a boom in digital transformation as enterprises have sought to modernize their operations to take advantage of a new, more flexible world of work.

But this change has often led to unwieldy data structures that are difficult to manage, which means that extracting value from the data is harder than it should be.

IT infrastructure is increasingly diverse, with organizations struggling to integrate data management and control.

The latest Enterprise Cloud Index from Nutanix shows the majority of IT teams (60 percent) use more than one IT infrastructure -- a trend that's expected to intensify in the future -- but struggle with visibility of data across environments.

Whether you're trying to buy something or just looking for information, not being able to find what you want on a website is frustrating.

So it's not surprising that in a new survey of search practitioners from website search platform Lucidworks, 100 percent of respondents rank search relevance as being 'Highly Important'. What's more, 76 percent expect search relevance to become even more important in the future.

Getting value from data is not something that can be done in a (data) snap. The journey is often long and tumultuous. According to a recent survey, 99 percent of companies recognize that data is crucial for success; however, 97 percent face challenges in using data effectively.

The spread of data sources, volume, and too few resources prevent organizations effectively managing the growing demand for trusted data at the speed required by businesses. And that means little data -- if any -- can be relied upon to make critical business decisions. But there are simple key steps that every company can make to help them ensure a sustainable data management practice that will enable them to accelerate time to value.

Sharing is caring, as the saying goes, but when it comes to business data oversharing is a big problem. A new report from Concentric AI shows the number of overshared files rose 60 percent in 2022 compared to 2021.

Largely this is down to the impact of hybrid remote work, cloud migration and information sprawl across on-premises and cloud data, as well as email and messaging environments on data security.

It is estimated that by 2025, the annual global data consumption will amount to 181 zettabytes -- over ten times more than in 2015. Does it mean we will make ten times better-informed business decisions? Most likely not, and the reason is simple: according to different sources, 75 percent or more of the data companies collect lurks in the dark.

'Dark data' is the vast amount of information collected by businesses but never analyzed or used. It can be web and app logs, email correspondence, visitor tracking data, the information generated by IoT devices, etc. Nowadays, every business activity is recorded somehow. Most of this data is unstructured and gathered in different formats. This cornucopia of information has to be processed, stored, secured, and maintained. Instead of increasing ROI, it increases noise, hidden costs, and safety issues since companies are legally responsible for all the collected data, even if they don’t use it.

A new global survey of nearly 10,000 business leaders shows 80 percent say data is crucial to decision making in their organization.

However, the study from Salesforce also shows that a third lack the ability to generate insights from data, only 29 percent are using data to inform their strategy when launching in new markets, and 67 percent are not using data to decide on pricing in line with economic conditions, such as inflation.

Data science involves analyzing and interpreting large, complex amounts of data and turning it into valuable insight to achieve business goals. Though not exactly a breakthrough field now, it has changed many aspects of how markets conduct business.

In a conversation with Jerry Johnson, founder and president of Marketing Data Science Associates and director of Cascade Strategies, we talk about data science, its applications in marketing, and its future with the emergence of AI.

Rolling out digital transformation projects involves navigating increasingly strict data protection regulations, while at the same time coping with risk and inefficiency associated with data silos and copy-based data integration.

Today a pioneering national standard approved by the Standards Council of Canada has been published aimed at providing organizations with a framework to accelerate the delivery of digital innovation projects.