When rain clouds gather: Digital curation of South African public records in the cloud

Abstract

Background: Many scholars lament of poor infrastructure for the management and preservation of digital records in the public sector in South Africa. For example, in South Africa, the national archives repository and its subsidiary provincial archives do not have infrastructure to ingest digital records into archival custody. As a result, digital records are left to the creating agencies to manage and preserve. The problem is compounded by the fact that very few public sector organisations in South Africa have procured systems to manage digital records.Objective: This study investigated whether government departments in South Africa entrust their records to cloud storage. The study asked the questions: How are digital records managed and stored in these organisations? Do government departments entrust their records to the cloud as an alternative storage?Method: Qualitative data were collected through interviews with purposively chosen chief information officers, records managers and IT managers from public entities that implemented e-government services, as well as officials from the National Archives and Services of South Africa, which is charged with the statutory regulatory role of records management in governmental bodies and the State Information Technology Agency, a public sector Information Communication Technology (ICT) company established in 1999 to consolidate and coordinate the state's information technology resources. Results:The key findings suggest that although public servants informally and unconsciously save some records in the cloud, government departments in South Africa are sceptical to entrust their records in the cloud because of a number of reasons such as lack of trust in the cloud storage, jurisdiction, legal implications, privacy and security risks related to Minimum Information Security Standards, as well as lack of policy and legislative framework, specifically regarding cloud storage. Conclusion:Because of lack of infrastructure for management and preservation of digital records, for the purpose of increased storage and access, this study recommends that government departments should cautiously consider exploring the possibility of storing their records in a trusted digital repository cloud as an interim solution whilst observing legal obligations. As cloud storage is not very prevalent amongst government departments in South Africa, given the present challenges in managing digital records, it would be advantageous to have cloud storage tested rigorously before embarking on the exercise.

Migration of government records from on-premises to cloud computing storage in South Africa

“…Al-Mudawi et al (2019) opine that cloud services contribute to the flexibility of organisational computing, fast deployment, and alignment with IT services, to mention only a few. Shibambu and Ngoepe (2020) hold the view that the public sector does not want to migrate its records to the cloud due to fears relating to data security, privacy, and reliability. Furthermore, the latency, vendor lock, legal issues concerning jurisdiction for data storage and access, contracts, infrastructure providers, conditions of termination, and types of outsourcing are some of the other concerns of CC's espousal.…”

The state of digital records preservation in South Africa’s public sector in the 21st century: a literature review

“…Shibambu and Ngoepe (2020, p. 4) cited Katuu (2015) as stating that the NARS policies and guidelines were most recently revised in 2006. In the early 2000s, the NARS sought to assist public sector institutions in managing their digital records more efficiently (Shibambu and Ngoepe, 2020, p. 4).…”

“…Shibambu and Ngoepe (2020, p. 4) cited Katuu (2015) as stating that the NARS policies and guidelines were most recently revised in 2006. In the early 2000s, the NARS sought to assist public sector institutions in managing their digital records more efficiently (Shibambu and Ngoepe, 2020, p. 4). However, the transfer of digital records from public institutions to archival custody has not occurred in a systematic manner because of the inability of the national archival system to effectively manage these records and facilitate their long-term preservation (Shibambu and Ngoepe, 2020, p. 4 cited in Katuu and Ngoepe, 2015).…”

“…This situation has led the government to leave the management and preservation of digital records to creating agencies at the national department level (Katuu and Ngoepe, 2015; Nkala et al , 2012). Because of the lack of digital record management systems among most South African institutions, the problem is magnified (Shibambu and Ngoepe, 2020, p. 1). Balogun and Kalusopa (2021, p. 188) also note that there are no solid digital preservation plans, strategies or policies in place for the long-term preservation of resources outside a few warehouses that are OASIS-compliant.…”

The challenges of post custodial management of digital records in Botswana laid bare

“…This is not peculiar to Botswana. In South Africa, studies by Ngoepe (2017), Shibambu and Ngoepe (2020) and Shibambu and Marutha (2022) show the country is also in a similar predicament as there is inadequate of infrastructure to ingest digital records in archival custody). Some positive development in South Africa is that the State Information Technology Agency has started work towards the development of ICT infrastructure to facilitate digital records management in the cloud.…”