DATA BACKUP | 4.5 MIN READ
It's not a matter of it but when a network outage will happen. Between the unpredictability of Mother Nature causing a flood or power outage, or the increased activity from cyber criminals that can hack and disrupt your network, your next network outage could strike at any moment. Without a robust data backup solution, your business risks losing important company data. Safeguard your business' data with a comprehensive backup solution. Keep reading to learn why corporate data backup is important and what solutions your business can implement to protect your data.
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Why is Corporate Data Backup Important?
Imagine all the important files that your employees create every day, from contracts and sales records to financial documents and more.
Now imagine if all those files were permanently deleted. This is what can happen when your business doesn't employ a robust data backup solution.
When your data isn't consistently backed up, in the event of a network outage, you may have to restore your network to the most recent backup in order to bring it back to full functionality.
If your last backup was completed a month ago, you could easily lose every file that was created or updates made to existing documents in the past month.
There are two key points to effective corporate data backup: consistency and security.
As discussed in the example above, inconsistent backups lead to potentially severe consequences in the event of a network outage. When creating a data backup solution for your business, ensure that backups happen as often as possible, preferably multiple times a day. Backups can be automated using a third-party platform or by working with a Managed Service Provider.
To ensure that your data backup solution is secure, consider where your data will be backed up and how it will be backed up. Many businesses employ a cloud-based solution to secure data from the whims of Mother Nature and the tactics of criminals.
Keep reading for some solutions on how you can create a consistent and secure data backup solution for your business.
Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery (BCDR) plans are utilized by businesses to ensure that operations run smoothly with minimal downtime and data loss in the event of network outages caused by breaches or natural disasters.
Business Continuity plans re-direct resources, establish chains of command, and coordinate shifts in employees so that business operations have minimal interruptions during natural disasters and network outages.
Disaster Recovery plans mainly focus on how to utilize effective IT to quickly recover one's network with minimal downtime and data loss. A few main tenants of Disaster Recovery plans include server and network restoration and backup recovery.
By creating a comprehensive BCDR plan for your organization, you ensure that data is consistently backed up and that, in the event of a network outage, data loss is minimal.
The key with BCDR plans is to regularly test and update them, as business processes and key personnel may shift over time.
RELATED: How to Build a BCDR Plan
Compared to on-premise data backup, cloud backup is superior in a number of ways.
Some businesses could find the cloud to be more secure because your data isn't physically at your office for hackers or employees with bad intentions to easily take. This can lessen the odds of a data breach.
Additionally, your cloud-based data isn't as susceptible to robbers and acts of nature because data centers usually have strengthened walls and advanced fire/temperature gauging systems, among other security features.
With cloud-based security, data center employees are there solely to protect your data. On the other hand, if you only have internal IT personnel to protect your data, those employees could get distracted by other tasks, which means they might not have as much time to focus on solely protecting your network.
While on-premise setups can also keep data secure with high efficiency from the start, as a cloud system learns your network and grows with you, over time it can become more secure than on-premise security.
While companies who must comply with data security regulations might be hesitant to keep data in the cloud, as long as their cloud security provider does their due diligence in staying compliant and up to code, risk can be effectively mitigated.
Consider this − according to Gartner, 95% of cloud-based security failures through 2020 will be the customers' fault, for instance if they fall for a phishing scheme or use easy-to-crack passwords. So, some of the risk of cloud-based data breaches could be managed simply by training your employees on cyber security best practices.
RELATED: Cyber Security Solutions: 12 Best Practices for Businesses
Technology develops at such a rapid pace that what's cutting-edge today can quickly become outdated tomorrow. If on-premise data centers break or become obsolete, the cost and time to move your data can be a burden.
With cloud storage, your data is housed in a data center forever. This is especially a benefit, because as more and more job operations move online, having your data already in a data center can streamline business processes.
RELATED: How Much Does Business Cloud Storage Cost?
Downtime can have significant consequences for a company. For businesses that prioritize keeping network downtime to a minimum, the cloud could be the way to go because it backs up your data in multiple places.
This means that in the event of a network outage, your data can be restored from a backup faster than an on-premise situation. With an on-premise setup, since your data is housed onsite, if a server were to go down, that data can't easily be recovered from, for instance, a data center in another location.
Scalability is an area where the cloud has a clear advantage. With the cloud, data centers can quickly re-adjust their resources to meet client demand. For instance, if a company experienced rapid growth and needed to expand their infrastructure and computing power, the cloud could do this with ease.
In this same scenario, a company with on-premise security would have to quickly invest in more hardware and software to build up their infrastructure. Startups and other fast-growing businesses could benefit immensely from this model. Additionally, companies with a large amount of remote workers could benefit from the scalability of cloud-based security.
RELATED: What's the Best Cloud Storage for Businesses? [Reviews and Tips]
As a business, you understand the importance of safeguarding your data. By employing a robust data backup system, you ensure that in the event of network downtime, data can be quickly recovered.
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