Juma Al Majid Centre Holds a Seminar to Mark International Archives Day

The Juma Al Majid Centre for Culture and Heritage in Dubai held an online seminar to mark International Archives Day, observed annually on 9 June. Participants included Dr Issam Obeid, associate professor specialising in knowledge management, organisational learning and smart archiving systems; cybersecurity consultant Sami A Nour; and Ahmed Obeid, a consultant and trainer in document management and electronic archiving.

A Financial and Intellectual Resource

Dr Issam opened by stressing the need for institutions and companies to invest in electronic archiving. Such investment supports continuous improvement and allows the knowledge contained in documents to become a financial, intellectual, social and cultural resource. It also promotes sustainable development, preserves institutional memory and encourages staff to recognise the administrative importance of retaining documents and records.

Sami A Nour then discussed the role of information security in protecting digital archives: ‘Digital transformation has increased data use and storage. Every home now needs a personal or family digital archive to document and preserve important files, records and visual material, preventing their loss or damage. Information security best practices must be applied so these files do not leak or fall into malicious hands.’

Ahmed Obeid concluded by discussing photographic archives and the challenges faced by history and heritage institutions in preserving and cataloguing photographs. He noted that photographs differ from texts in how they must be archived and stored, as well as in the specialist skills required to handle them.

Source: Al Bayan