VARs have just over a month to take advantage of the opportunity presented by the forthcoming European Union (EU) Data Retention Directive.

From 15 September, UK telecoms providers must have a management system in place to allow them to capture and store call detail records (CDRs) for 12 months. The UK has opted to postpone the requirement that covers email and internet communications until March 2009.

One vendor hoping to capitalise on this is Hitachi Data Systems (HDS), which has combined its Content Archive Platform with software developer Filetek's StorHouse data storage and access management system. The vendor said this meets the requirements of the Data Retention Directive.

According to HDS, the offering is the only one to retain CDRs in their original structured format, ensuring integrity. It also offers fingerprinting and encryption, which guarantees authenticity.

Lynn Collier, solutions director EMEA at HDS, told CRN: 'Telcos have to comply. This is where resellers can step in. HDS and Filetek's solution can offer them something that can be implemented in two to four weeks. It is an off-the-shelf product.

It's also another reason to go back to existing customers. The solution we have will enable VARs to make their customers compliant, but it can also be used to create an enterprise-wide open-source storage architecture.

Fernando Elizalde, senior IT analyst at Frost & Sullivan, said: 'Under the regulations data will need to be accessed immediately so it needs to be stored online or nearline and needs to be secure. Other vendors have launched solutions to help telcos comply, such as Logica with its Pharos product.'

Data retention: the facts

One billion call detail records (CDRs) may need to be collected and retained within the course of a single business day once the directive comes into force, so storage systems need to be able to scale without performance degredation.

Any storage system that meets the needs of the directive has to be able to retain data for the time specified, be able to perform data destruction, be able to authenticate the records to ensure that they are not altered and be able to produce CDR records as and when requested.

Telcos face inspections and fines if they fail to comply.