It’s always great to have a backup plan for the fall of human civilisation. For Australia, that’s a huge box in the middle of nowhere. For startup Lonestar Data Holdings, a vague “Moon Servers”. But why on Earth — pun intended — would we store all of humanity's data on a dead rock in space?
Why is Lonestar Data Holdings making Moon Servers?
Via The Register, Lonestar is proposing the creation of huge datacenters on the surface of The Moon that will backup all of humanity’s data. From social media posts to outdated advice animal memes, everything could be stored on Earth’s satellite.
Lonestar founder and CEO Christopher Scott explained that Earth’s precious data needs to be moved off-planet. With climate change causing huge issues, keeping data on The Moon may be the only way of saving it.
"It's inconceivable to me that we are keeping our most precious assets, our knowledge and our data, on Earth, where we're setting off bombs and burning things," Scott said. "We need to put our assets in place off our planet, where we can keep it safe."
Scott compared the situation to the flooding of the Seed Bank in 2017. Located in Spitsbergen in the Arctic Circle, the melting of permafrost resulted in the vault flooding, destroying humanity’s backup of plant seeds.
"The seed bank flooded due to effects of climate change,” Scott said. “It's also susceptible to other forms of destruction like war or cyber attacks. We need to have somewhere we can keep our data safe." Lonestar has its sights set on the Moon.
Read More: Melting permafrost will release ancient diseases we’re not equipped to handle
Investors are pumping millions into Lonestar
At the time of writing, Lonestar Data Holdings has secured a first round investment of $5 million. This money will fund prototype versions of its Moon servers, highlighting how the technology works and how it can be used in the future.
At the end of this year, a small mission will store the first piece of data on The Moon. However, if successful, Lonestar’s second mission will see a team of robots build the first Moon Server in 2023. The small “hardback” sized device will store 16 terabytes of data.
Lunar datacenters will be housed in The Moon’s “lava tubes”. This is because the centres’ temperature can be more easily regulated next to ancient lava.