Can you afford not to have an online backup solution in place?

When it comes to securing your business’s important data, there are three options: do nothing, use local backup or use remote/online backup.

Doing nothing is definitely not an option. Whether we like it or not, data loss is a real and significant threat to business continuity in the age of technology, and the modern business revolves around its data. Imagine what the loss of accounts files, a product database, client files, personnel records, or emails would cost your business.

Most companies have been doing some form of local backup for many years, usually involving storage of data onto a tape drive or external hard drive. But there are problems here too – local backup is vulnerable to neglect and unstable hardware and it is often insecure.

When it comes to online backup, the idea behind it is simple. By continuously backing up data on a remote hard drive, the risk of catastrophic data loss as a result of fire, theft, file corruption, or other disaster is practically eliminated.

Typically, third-party providers are used for online backup, thus removing the need for businesses to invest in their own hardware and infrastructure. At the same time, inexpensive bandwidth and the decreased cost of storage means cloud-based solutions are now allowing even the smallest businesses to safely secure their data without fear of loss.

Failure to invest in online backup could be the worst business decision you make, as there are a great number of reasons you may be glad for having your data backed up with an online solution. Here are some of them:

• Online backup solutions are safe and secure

The safety and security of your data is a very important issue. There was a time when the security of your data traveling over the Internet was questionable, but nowadays a good online backup solution will encrypt your data before and while it travels through the net. Some programs even secure your data with 448-bit Blowfish encryption with 128-bit SSL support to keep your data safe during transport. That sounds very secure to me!

• Hard drives crash

Many issues can appear and make a computer crash and lose all of your data along with the crash. Hard drives are only hardware and hardware does not last forever. Most experts agree that the maximum lifespan for any computer is only five years, but given the costs, time, and potential issues involved, most companies will delay upgrades for as long as possible.

• Automatic backup

An online backup solution usually gives you a choice of a full or incremental backup of your data. For the first backup, you would want to do a full backup of all of your important files. Moreover, you could choose to do an incremental backup so every time your data is changed, the software will automatically back it up at a time you specify.

• Theft and rogue employees

There are two sources of theft to worry about. Of course, there are the typical smash-and-grab raids that are very common in big cities and unsecured premises, but you also need to consider opportunistic theft. It can occur when a person leaves their laptop unattended in a coffee-shop or accidentally leaves it on public transport. Also, rogue employees are a big threat to information security.

In short, the solution to all these threats is frequent online backup, and not having a plan in place is just a bad business decision. What’s preventing you from investing in an online backup solution right now? Can you afford not to have a plan in place?

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