Mindlessly dumping photos on the cloud and forgetting about them entirely is something many of us are guilty of – but four tech experts have warned the common habit may come at a big cost
We’ve all been guilty of taking a picture, dumping it into the cloud, and forgetting all about it. It’s a shameful habit that makes the film camera churn in it’s grave – and it could end up costing us a fortune. While some of our images hold sentimental value, such as memories of a loved one you’ve lost, too many of us hold onto pointless content that we will never actually look at or think about again. We’re talking old memes that are no longer funny, selfies your annoying ex would send over WhatsApp, and all of the times you’ve accidentally screenshotted your homepage.
Research from pCloud suggests the average person stores a whopping 500GB of data in their personal cloud storage, with photos and image files taking up the majority (46 per cent). This is equivalent to a whopping 137,237 pictures for just one person, and a colossal leap from a decade ago, where the average user had 630 photos and 24 videos stored on their phone. “Think about it—how many of the photos on your phone do you actually look at?” asks Brenda Beltrán of Holafly. “Yet they’re sitting there, duplicated in multiple places, taking up space.”
Perhaps a kind of cognitive dissonance has formed because we can’t physically see the data centres that store all of our files. Back in the noughties, all our storage was somewhat tangible. CDs, DVDs, printed images etc took up actual room in our homes, and when it felt like we’d collected too much – we’d simply get rid. But with services like the cloud, that instinct has seemingly vanished. “But it’s not free, either for your wallet or the planet,” warns Brenda. “Data centres take up a lot of energy, and while companies like Google or Amazon are working on making them greener, the sheer volume of stuff people are storing is staggering.”
The very notion of paying to access your own photos and videos would once sound ludicrous, but the commodification of digital storage has very quickly become normalised. Most data storage services now charge a monthly fee, which means you’re forever in debt if you want to keep your photos and videos. If you’re unable to keep up with the payments, you will be given a grace period to download your content before it is removed.
At the moment, storage plans are relatively cheap but have increased in recent years. For example, Apple now charges 99p per month for 50GB of storage, £2.99 a month for 200GB, and £8.99 for 2TB – a 25 per cent up charge from 2023. Amazon Prime members can currently get 5GB of full-resolution storage from Amazon Photos for free, or upgrade to 100GB per month for £1.49, or £7.99 for 1TB.
“This trend will continue, and it’s going to force people to rethink what’s worth keeping,” predicts Taimur Ijlal, a tech expert and information security leader at Proxy Coupons. James Bore, a Chartered Security Professional, agrees and says that most larger storage companies have been subsidised for years by ‘heavy investments’ and have therefore ‘provided storage as a loss-leader’. “Now that people have much of their digital lives stored with these platforms, expect to see them start turning the screws to get their investment back,” he added.
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If prices of data storage drastically increase, consumers will be forced to make a choice ‘between convenience and intentionality’, says Brenda. But, instead of scrawling through thousands and thousands of old images and having to decide which ones are worth keeping, many experts suspect that artificial intelligence (AI) will eventually do the hard work for you. “The future probably involves more AI-driven storage management, where algorithms decide what to save or purge based on usage patterns,” states Taimur. “That’s going to raise privacy concerns, but it’s where we’re heading.”
This could include deleting photos that you haven’t opened in a certain length of time or duplicate images. AI could also be used to delete images based on detecting a certain person’s face – meaning you can clear all evidence of your ex with one button. Naturally, the idea of AI being in charge of what images you keep and delete sounds a little dystopian. Another growing concern around data storage has to be its environmental impact. Yes, clutching onto one too many pictures of your dog might not seem like a recipe for climate disaster – but a single data centre can reportedly consume the equivalent electricity of 50,000 homes.
“The carbon footprint resulting from data storage is mainly due to the energy consumption required in powering the data centres that store massive volumes of information, such as photos and videos,” said Jacob Kalvo, CEO of Live Proxies. “These centres rely heavily on electricity, and unless they are powered by renewable energy, they contribute to carbon emissions. As data consumption increases further, it is very important that businesses and individuals pay attention to how their choices in data storage affect the planet.”
As electricity becomes more and more expensive, the costs of running data centres will also increase – once again putting the financial impact onto the consumer. So the next time you whip your phone out to take a picture – stop and think whether it’s really worth it.
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