The data will be stored in nuclear-weapons hardened data vault under the Swiss mountains near Gstaad dubbed the ‘Swiss Fort Knox’ and will be constantly added too as part of a €15m project/
"The time capsule being deposited inside Swiss Fort Knox contains the digital equivalent of the genetic code of different data formats, a 'digital genome'," the British Library's Adam Farquhar, one of two computer scientists and archivists entrusted with transferring the capsule, told Reuters.
"Einstein's notebooks you can take down off the shelf and read them today. Roll forward 50 years and most of Stephen Hawking's notes will likely only be stored digitally and we might not be able to access them all."
The current time capsule has five of today’s most common types of digital objects. Each is converted into formats to help preserve them for the long-term and stored on a range of media from punch-cards to paper, microfilm, floppy disc, audio tape, CD, DVD, USB and Blu Ray.
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| Into the mountain: workers move a container into the "Swiss Fort Knox" |
The scheme is part of the four-year
Planets project, which draws on the expertise of 16 European libraries, archives and research institutions, to preserve the world's digital assets for 100 years or more.
"Unlike hieroglyphics carved in stone or ink on parchment, digital data has a shelf life of years not millennia," said Andreas Rauber, a professor at the University of Technology of Vienna, which is a partner in the project.
"Failure to implement adequate digital preservation measures now could cost us billions in the future," Rauber said,
