Bit bucket

In computing jargon, the bit bucket (or byte bucket) is where lost computerized data has gone, by any means; any data which does not end up where it is supposed to, being lost in transmission, a computer crash, or the like, is said to have gone to the bit bucket – that mysterious place on a computer where lost data goes, as in:

The errant byte, having failed the parity test, is unceremoniously dumped into the bit bucket, the computer's wastepaper basket.

— Erik Sandberg-Diment, New York Times, 1985.

Millions of dollars in time and research data gone into the bit-bucket?

— W. Paul Blase, The Washington Post, 1990.