No end in sight to the digital data deluge.

• Position: STUDY

The world's information is doubling every two years, according to IDC, with 1.8 zettabytes (1.8 trillion gigabytes) created and replicated this year alone. That's enough information to fill 57.5 billion 32GB iPads.

The 2011 IDC Digital Universe Study sponsored by EMC includes the vast amount of data that is created and stored, as well as transient data that is typically not stored, including digital television signals for shows watched, but not recorded.

The study highlighted the consequences of storing, managing, and securing all that information. Over the next 10 years, the study said, the number of servers (virtual and physical) around the world will increase 10-fold, the amount of data management by data centers will increase 50-fold, and the number of files they will have to process will increase at least 75-fold. Meanwhile, IDC noted, the number of IT professionals in the world who are responsible for managing all that information will only grow by a factor of 1.5.

Other findings include:

* Since 2005, annual enterprise investments in the cloud, hardware, software, services, and staff to create, manage, store, and generate revenue from information have increased 50% to $4 trillion.

* Although cloud computing accounts for less than 2% of IT spending now, almost 20% of information will be "touched" by the cloud by 2015 somewhere in a byte's journey from originator to disposal.

* Too much data remain vulnerable to hackers and thieves. IDC estimates about half the information that should be protected in the digital universe are protected.

* In 2011, the cost of creating, capturing, managing, and storing data was down to one-sixth of what it...