Caringo builds secure CAS storage appliance on USB

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Start-up company Caringo is looking to challenge EMC and other vendors in the content-addressable storage market.

Using just a USB stick, Caringo aims to turn any industry-standard server into a content addressable storage node.

Content-addressable storage, or CAS, is a technology which turns a fixed-content data file, which is data that once stored does not need to be changed, into an object using a cryptographic algorithm to develop a unique object based on the content of the file to be stored.

Because each object is unique, even a slight change to the content of the file changes the hashed object, making it possible to eliminate duplicate files. Using CAS technology also prevents the unauthorized reading of stored information, and allows administrators to see if data has been changed from when it was originally stored.

Mark Goros, CEO of Caringo, said his company is looking to bring a disruptive CAS technology to market in that the company’s CAStor is a software-only product that works with any x86-based server, unlike other CAS products that are sold as pre-packaged CAS appliances, such as the Centera.

CAStor is also suitable to work with fixed-content files of any size, said Goros. This is an important differentiator from appliances such as Centera, which has trouble working with multiple small files such as check images, he said.

The operating system and the software for CAStor is sold pre-loaded on a USB memory stick, Goros said. To use it, the solution provider plugs the device into the server’s USB port, and 60 seconds later they have a CAS node. This process can be repeated for thousands of servers, all of which can be connected together in a CAS cluster, he said.

Once so configured, each data file is stored at least twice in the cluster. For disaster recovery purposes, users can specify that additional copies are stored at a remote location.

Another capability unique to the CAStor is an upgradeable hashing algorithm, said Carpentier. Increased computing power means that over time the cryptographic algorithms used to hash an object from the contents of a data file are more and more susceptible to being broken and making it possible to modify or delete the data. “Over the long term, the only way to ensure the integrity of the data is to upgrade the hashing technology,” he said.

Should customers need to upgrade or replace a CAStor node, they can tell the server to retire itself, at which time it stops accepting content, moves its existing content to the network, and then goes out, said Carpentier. Or users can just yank the server out, and the other servers will rebuild the data, he said.

The company is looking to ISVs, system integrators and custom system builders as the main go-to-market route for CAStor, which is expected to start shipping in late June, said Goros.

CAStor is list priced at about US$1000 for each hard drive that is added to the cluster. That averages to about US$4 per GB of storage, including the cost of the hard drive, when used with 500-Gbyte SATA drives, said Goros. That does not include the cost of the x86 server, he said.