For the majority of SME companies, their key critical data they held on computer systems, is essential in the running and profitability of their businesses. In today's climate of data protection, data loss and data hacking, most businesses have some form of data protection on their systems; either an anti-virus software, anti spyware or firewall. The more astute will have taken steps to protect their critical data whether by making a duplicate and putting it on an external drive or using free software available to back up their data to their system. Larger companies tend to invest in a tape back up system, which necessitates the need to regularly change the tape drives and replace the drives as they start to wear or become full.
The point being is that critical business data is at the heart of a company and without your sales ledger, payroll details, client database; most companies would not know where to turn for help. The recent floods caused chaos to a huge number of businesses and lead to some of these going to the wall, as they lost everything. Even if a suitable insurance product had been put into place for business continuity, the cash injection cannot replace the data. I know of companies who had servers backing up to duplicate servers sitting next to each other that were both flooded. There are a number of solutions to help businesses prevent this eventuality; it doesn't have to be just flooding for these solutions to work.
First, any back up is better than none and a good start to helping you if loose or damage your data. If you have a back up drive make sure it is away from your main system (some people even take them home, but be careful this can cause more harm as a disk drive has moving parts and these can get damaged in transit). If you have a tape back up system, make sure that the drives are regularly verified (to make sure that what you are backing up is actually backing up to the various tapes being used), a network support company should be able to offer this service. If you have back up servers make sure the location of the back up is away from the original, better still another floor or building. If these methods and solutions either seem to complex or involve too much expense or expertise why not back up your data off site with a data back up company.
Data Back up companies tend to offer a simple back up software solution which will back up all of your critical business data via your own system, encrypt this data and then transfer it via the internet to either Servers or Data Centres. Once the data back up has been completed the software will send an e-mail to you to say the process has been successfully completed. All of this can be easily automated so that once you have decided what key data you want backing up, the software will doing it at regular intervals, whatever you decide. If you need to retrieve your data at any point for any reason it can downloaded from the Server/Data Centre and re-installed to your system.
Most businesses are now considering a disaster recovery route which involves data back up and off site data back up is certainly one option I would whole heartedly recommend any business to have, as the cost of implementing this solution is extremely small compared the cost of losing your data and possibility of your business. But if you haven't already addressed the issue of data back up, what exists for the company who has suffered the loss of data or suffered a disaster? Data recovery is a well established arm of corporate business and is a necessity in helping business who has suffered data loss. Not all data is recoverable, it depends on what has happened to the drive, but the majority of Data Recovery companies, have a high percentage rate of recovering data. Even some of the flood damaged drives examined, have been able to be recovered via a quite complex process, but this does take time and a great deal of expertise and with any type of cure is usually more expensive than the prevention.
Inevitably accidents will happen; dropping a laptop, reformatting a drive, but all is not lost. But prevention is always better cure and knowing that a cure exists at all is better than despair. Make a good business decision and make sure your critical data is securely backed up, preferably off site. Neil Adgie - Director - Data Solutions UK Ltd 0845 200 6721
Neil Adgie - Director - Data Solutions UK Ltd
0845 200 6721
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