ROT (Redundant, Obsolete, Trivial) (ROT)
Data with no business, legal, or historical value — duplicate, expired, or trivial content — that inflates storage cost and risk and should be defensibly cleaned up.
ROT stands for Redundant, Obsolete, and Trivial information — the accumulated digital clutter that has no ongoing business, legal, or historical value. Redundant is duplicate content scattered across systems; obsolete is content whose useful life and retention requirement have passed; trivial is material that never had record value (personal files, spam, throwaway notes).
ROT is expensive and risky at scale: it consumes storage and backup, buries genuine records (slowing search, FOIA, and e-discovery), and increases breach and litigation exposure — especially when it contains personal data. Reducing ROT is a core information governance activity, but it must be done defensibly: a retention schedule and litigation holds determine what may be disposed of and what must be preserved.