Save Your Business by Backing up Data to the Cloud

Jan 20, 2012 by Ajeet Khurana

Today’s businesses, particularly those running internet based business are at constant risk of data loss via a number of methods.

The ways we can lose data include hardware failures, fires, natural disasters, computer hackers, malicious employee activity, terrorism, and many other events.

We can look at ways to protect our business by hiring a lot of expensive consultants to assess the risks of all of these things, including meteorologists, data security experts, human resource consultants, industrial relations experts and physical security experts who can all confirm that risks exist and tell you how much risk there actually is. This might be extremely useful information if you are a large business, but if you are a small or medium business, or a computer hobbyist then there is one simple message.

Back your data up.
Previously, some people may have justified poor adherence to backups because of the lack of off-site options available to them. They could say, ‘Great, I’ve got all this data backed up to my media, and I’m going to put it in this pedestal drawer, if the building burns down we’re going to lose all our data’. Some people purchased fireproof safes. This still might not help for all natural disasters.

One of the best places to save your data is on the cloud. With a number of very large companies offering competing simple storage solutions on the net, the price of off-site backup is extremely cheap. The best bit is that we can choose data centres almost anywhere in the world, so we can keep our valuable data in Singapore or the United States or many different locations in Europe. With the advent of high speed internet it is quite feasible to back up several gigabytes of data in a few hours, so this can be done reasonably often as well.

The price of cloud storage presently is around 15c a gigabyte or less, so cost is not an argument against this.

There are some concerns like data security and interception, so be sure that encrypted transfer is used if you feel the data is sensitive. A security consultant might be a worthwhile investment if you are unsure about the risks involved. Overall, cloud services are run by some very large businesses who spend a great deal of money ensuring your data is secure so this shouldn’t be a worry for most people.

Here is a list of some of the big names in cloud storage.

Amazon Web Services
Microsoft Azure (Blob)
Dropbox
SugarSync
Rackspace Cloud
Google Storage

Between these businesses, you should be able to find a service that you feel comfortable with.

A final note is that a backup is not a proper backup until you have tested it. Test your backups, always, and regularly.

With a well thought out backup strategy using cloud services, you will be able to run your business with confidence and less fear of data loss. This will save you money on worry about things that won’t hurt you that much, since you can quickly restore from your secure and tested backups.

Hopefully you’ve gained something from reading this article. If you are looking for accountants Perth, then be sure to contact McKinley Plowman. We provide expert accounting services for people in Perth. This article was written by a guest author. Would you like to write for us?