Smarter Content Cleanup with Autoclassification

I grew up in a time when it was common for people to take endless mirror selfies, never deleting any of them. My memory cards were packed with random, pointless photos that I’ll most likely never look at again. In hindsight, it was such a waste of storage to keep so many pictures of so little value.

While this is merely a small personal example, organizations run into similar problems, especially if they’ve been around for a while. Every year, piles of new documents are created across teams and departments. And even if a document is useful at the time it is created, many don’t stay relevant for very long.

This is what records management is all about: getting rid of information that’s not needed anymore, at the right time, so you can free up resources, cut down on risk, and stay on top of compliance. As a company that focuses on records management, we could go on and on about why it matters so much and how best to accomplish the task. (HINT: It’s very important, and we highly recommend making it a priority.) Organizations that have records management programs and policies in place usually have fewer problems with information overload, since they already have systems for sorting, keeping, and eventually tossing out old stuff.

But not every organization has the resources or the need to build a full records management program from scratch. That’s not surprising, since solid records management takes both good tools and dedicated people, and ultimately these resources aren’t always readily available. Still, the technical headaches and risks that come with growing piles of data don’t just magically go away on their own. Rather, they compound over time, especially with the prevalence of automation and artificial intelligence in the modern workplace. This new world makes hanging on to old content even more risky. Luckily, new tools relying on AI and Machine Learning can help you tackle your records management challenges before they balloon into major issues.

There’s a whole new wave of solutions out there for companies looking to clean up their digital clutter. Artificial intelligence and machine learning tools can easily determine which records and data are important while weeding out what’s just taking up space.

These tools are especially good at two things:

1.      Classifying content: Running content through large language models or specialized machine learning helps to determine the types of data you’re dealing with, quickly and easily. This is key for knowing what has real value and what needs to stick around for legal reasons or company rules.

2.      Extracting metadata: These use language models to grab key details, such as dates or vendor names, straight from the files. This extra information makes it easier to decide what you should keep and what’s safe to toss.

Let’s say you have a giant shared drive loaded with years’ worth of accounts payable documents, all thrown together in a mess. The data totals over a terabyte and is packed with sensitive records that have the potential to put your organization at risk. By running these through an automated tool, you can quickly spot which files are important, like contracts or purchase orders, and which ones can be deleted without worry, like old paid invoices. In this manner, you get an inventory of your records, suggested categories, and all the relevant dates.

With that, someone with experience can quickly scan the list and make calls about what stays and what goes, leading to tremendous time savings. You can shrink decades of data with way less effort than before, eliminating the need to open every single file, one by one.

As records managers, we think these new tools are a revolution in data clean up. With how fast artificial intelligence and machine learning are moving, these solutions are more accurate and helpful than ever. Having said that, we have noticed some gaps and missing features in the tools that are currently available on the market.

This is precisely why we built Peregrine Classify: a custom tool that uses AI and automation to find and clean up data. Peregrine Classify connects to your private endpoint for a large language model (never a public one), ensuring your data is always processed securely. The software then determines and categorizes your content, pulls out key details, and even catches duplicate files in the same spot.

In test runs with clients, Peregrine Classify is getting more accurate and effective in reducing the time it takes to sort and clean up your content. If you’ve ever faced the pain of cleaning up digital messes, this tool is a serious game changer, creating both efficiency and ease in an otherwise time and resource-consuming task.

If you want to know more about Peregrine Classify and its features, or hear some real-world success stories, please reach out to us at Cadence Solutions. We’d love to show the benefits and how Peregrine Classify can help get your digital world in order.