Nat’l Data Centre to quadruple capacity

The capacity of the National Data Centre (NDC), located on the Bangladesh Computer Council (BCC) premises in Agargaon, will be more than quadrupled by the end of this year, a BCC official has told The Independent. This will help the NDC meet the increasing demand for data in the country and save the backup of the smart national identity (NID) database. The BCC official said the current capacity of the NDC is 2.5 petabyte. All processes have been completed to add up to 12 petabyte (1 petabyte=1024 terabyte, 1 terabyte=1024 gigabyte) to the NDC capacity by December, he added. NDC director Tareq Barkatullah told The Independent that storage capacity has been increased under a Tk. 560-crore World Bank project titled ‘Leveraging ICT for Growth, Employment, and Governance (LICT)’. When the NDC was inaugurated in 2010, its storage capacity was only 30 terabyte. It took nearly two years to exceed that capacity. In 2014, its capacity was increased up to 750 terabyte, which became almost full within the next seven to eight months. “The process of giving smart NIDs has started, and we are upgrading the capacity of the NDC to host the backup of the
NID database,” said Barkatullah.
He also said data flow from different government entities has increased manifold in the last couple of years. Starting from taxpayer information to files of ministries and regulatory bodies, the volume of data being stored in NDC is huge.
“There is a huge inflow of data from the government’s land digitisation and birth registration processes. The current capacity of the NDC is not being able to keep pace with the data inflow,” he added.
Besides, the financial data of Bangladesh Bank and the commercial banks are stored in the NDC. This raised the demand for increasing the capacity of NDC, he added. Barkatullah said a National Disaster Data Recovery Centre (NDDRC) will be set up in Jessore to keep a backup of the NDC so that important data is not lost during natural calamities or any such emergencies The NDDRC will be housed in the Software Technology Park (STP), which is under construction in the south-western city of Bangladesh. Following preliminary assessment, the Jessore site has been declared low-risk for natural disasters, such as earthquakes, tsunamis and wildfires, among others, factors that are very crucial for setting up recovery data centres, he said. “At the beginning of next year, the NDDRC will be operational on a trial basis,” he said. The Investment Corporation of Bangladesh (ICB), along with state-owned commercial banks Sonali Bank, Janata Bank, Agrani Bank, Rupali Bank, Bangladesh Development Bank, and Sadharan Bima Corporation, provided funding to establish the NDDRC.

Natl Data Centre to quadruple capacity

The capacity of the National Data Centre (NDC), located on the Bangladesh Computer Council (BCC) premises in Agargaon, will be more than quadrupled by the end of this year, a BCC official has told The Independent. This will help the NDC meet the increasing demand for data in the country and save the backup of the smart national identity (NID) database. The BCC official said the current capacity of the NDC is 2.5 petabyte. All processes have been completed to add up to 12 petabyte (1 petabyte=1024 terabyte, 1 terabyte=1024 gigabyte) to the NDC capacity by December, he added. NDC director Tareq Barkatullah told The Independent that storage capacity has been increased under a Tk. 560-crore World Bank project titled Leveraging ICT for Growth, Employment, and Governance (LICT). When the NDC was inaugurated in 2010, its storage capacity was only 30 terabyte. It took nearly two years to exceed that capacity. In 2014, its capacity was increased up to 750 terabyte, which became almost full within the next seven to eight months. The process of giving smart NIDs has started, and we are upgrading the capacity of the NDC to host the backup of the NID database, said Barkatullah. He also said data flow from different government entities has increased manifold in the last couple of years. Starting from taxpayer information to files of ministries and regulatory bodies, the volume of data being stored in NDC is huge. There is a huge inflow of data from the governments land digitisation and birth registration processes. The current capacity of the NDC is not being able to keep pace with the data inflow, he added. Besides, the financial data of Bangladesh Bank and the commercial banks are stored in the NDC. This raised the demand for increasing the capacity of NDC, he added. Barkatullah said a National Disaster Data Recovery Centre (NDDRC) will be set up in Jessore to keep a backup of the NDC so that important data is not lost during natural calamities or any such emergencies The NDDRC will be housed in the Software Technology Park (STP), which is under construction in the south-western city of Bangladesh. Following preliminary assessment, the Jessore site has been declared low-risk for natural disasters, such as earthquakes, tsunamis and wildfires, among others, factors that are very crucial for setting up recovery data centres, he said. At the beginning of next year, the NDDRC will be operational on a trial basis, he said. The Investment Corporation of Bangladesh (ICB), along with state-owned commercial banks Sonali Bank, Janata Bank, Agrani Bank, Rupali Bank, Bangladesh Development Bank, and Sadharan Bima Corporation, provided funding to establish the NDDRC.