As Gulf Coast residents begin the cleanup process after the recent hurricanes, there are many possessions that people will go to great lengths to salvage. Among those possessions with the most sentimental value are family photos, stored either in traditional albums, or for digital photos, on computer hard drives, CDs and DVDs. While CDs and DVDs could be easily transported before the storms arrived, many people did not have the option of saving photos that were stored only on hard drives. In order to help them with the rebuilding process, Ontrack Data Recovery, the industry’s leading data recovery company, is teaming up with the Optical Storage Technology Association (OSTA) to provide home users affected by the hurricanes with free recovery of digital photos in the .JPG format through the end of November.

“Damage to personal property as a result of severe weather is certainly difficult and the thought of losing precious irreplaceable possessions such as digital photos can be devastating,” said Todd Johnson, vice president of Operations for Ontrack Data Recovery. “Fortunately, despite the outward appearance, the majority of digital photos can be recovered from storm-damaged hard drives. With help from OSTA, Ontrack is happy to offer the expertise of our more than 150 highly trained engineers in helping people rebuild by providing recovery of treasured digital photos at no charge.”

Loss of digital photos due to the hurricanes could be a significant problem since a majority of people do not make print copies of their pictures. According to the Photo Marketing Association, of the approximately 20 billion digital images that will be taken in 2005, nearly 65 percent, or more than 12 billion images, will not be printed and only stored in digital format (either on CDs, DVDs or hard drives).

OSTA and selected member companies are assisting with this program by providing the CDs or DVDs on which to store the recovered photos. Media manufacturer members of OSTA supporting this effort by donating media include Fuji Photo Film U.S.A., Inc., Imation Corp., Memorex Products, Inc., Maxell Corp. of America, Mitsui Advanced Media, Sony Electronics, TDK Electronics Corporation, and Verbatim Corp.

“OSTA and its media manufacturer members are pleased to support Ontrack’s generous photo recovery offer to help Gulf residents who may have lost treasured photos due to the hurricanes,” said David Bunzel, president of OSTA. “For people who are attempting to retrieve CDs and DVDs left behind in the storms, keep in mind that recovery for CDs or DVDs may be as simple as cleaning with disc cleaner or mild detergent and water and drying with a soft cloth, before checking to see if the disc can be read.”

“We also want to encourage all PC users and digital photographers to take the time to back up their data and photos so they can be easily transported in an emergency,” Bunzel continued. “Backing up to CDs and DVDs is probably the simplest and most effective insurance for protecting data, photos, and videos. Best practices for safeguarding very important data or images would also include making duplicate sets of CDs or DVDs and storing them in a separate location.”

For more information about this program, contact Ontrack Data Recovery at 1-800-350-4431 or ontrack.com or OSTA at 408-253-3695.