Black Swans are unpredictable events that are beyond what normal expectations that have potentially severe consequences. Such events are extremely rare with the insistence they were obvious in hindsight. The Pandemic and Russia’s Invasion of the Ukraine are just two examples of events that were black swans and are not part of history.
Current world events present us with several black swans. Most are horrific to consider like a global war, nuclear or biological weapons exchange, global famine, etc. These were once unthinkable but are now plausible. I would like to consider another black swan, one that does not destroy the planet per se, but would significantly disrupt global society.
The occurrence of a black swan sits at the heart of science fiction stories, particularly ones that lead to describing dystopian futures. One of those black swans is the complete erasure of all information stored in computer systems – the big wipe. A complete data wipe is central to recent shows from TV’s MR. ROBOT to the movie Fight Club. It is another black swan that is increasingly probable.
The Big Wipe – Global Digital Amnesia
Consider the possibility that all electronic information suddenly becomes unavailable, deleted, or digitally forgotten. Data is wiped clean off the face of the earth, clouds, systems ect. There are several paths to a big wipe, rather than worrying about the specific path, consider the impact and the actions required to handle such an event. A big wipe would mean:
No digital identity, access, authentication – the whole world loses its passwords and can’t recover them
No communications, even if the cellular phone network or internet are technically operational, without information they cannot run
No banking balances, records, accounts, or statements available online
No payroll, government benefits, etc,
I am sure there are more implications, but you get the idea – global digital amnesia.
Contemplating an analog only world
A big wipe would leave the people, the infrastructure, the physical world but wipe out the digital one. Traditional disaster recovery and resiliency plans would not only be irrelevant, but they would also most likely be lost in the wipe. It would be an analog only world, an overnight setback of 100 years.
A big wipe, regardless of its duration, would have significant economic, political, social, and environmental impacts. These can be so enormous that they lead people to not think about them and hope the never happen. Behaviors that exacerbate the impact of a black swan.
Here are some thoughts to consider if you want to prepare for such an unlikely but highly impactful event.
Businesses and Governments will need to consider how or even if they would conduct business without the data in systems. How would you interact with customers, citizens, or trading partners? What would you accept as customer or citizen proof of accounts, contracts, commitments, etc? How would you mobilize your people? What would they do without digital information across all locations?
If you think that we can just execute or Disaster Recovery or Business Continuity plans, think again. In this situation there is no data, anywhere and most DRBC plans are predicated localized outages – not outages everywhere. An alternative is to open your doors and serve people on a paper based or honors system and hope to settle-up later. Another is to guard your doors and sit tight hoping the data will be recovered. Either way it will take time, if it is possible at all.
People will need to consider how they protect and prove what they own and what they owe. This means creating paper copies of documents that matter like financial statements, paper copies of deeds to land, updated loan statements, treasured pictures, etc. Without credit cards you will need some paper money, coins, even perhaps gold and silver. We will assume that public services like police and fire will still be operational – most likely on a volunteer basis – but without digital communications response services will be slower.
It may not be Armageddon, but life will be significantly disrupted for some time. Stocking up on canned goods, working with your neighbors and watching out for each other will be important.