From customer information to important emails and billing databases, the data in your company is vital. Here are four common mistakes that businesses make when backing up and protecting their data.
1. Not backing up data at all
It may seem like common sense that you should back up your data. However, a 2011 study from Semantic found that only half of businesses back up more than 60% of their data. Other businesses don’t back up data or only back up certain systems. This means that if these businesses were faced with a disaster, they could lose up to 40% – or even more – of their data. All of your data should be backed up, so that should a disaster happen, you can guarantee that nothing will be lost.
2. Failing to protect off-site data
Business is becoming increasingly spread out, with many employees working from outside of the office, or on their own systems. People who telecommute or use their own systems usually store important data on their local machines. Which means that data on machines outside of the company premises may not be backed up.
What’s more, some industries have regulations stating that you must back up data from all end-points (that is, all types of computers and mobile devices) regardless of their location. So, when you are backing up data, be sure that you also back up data on systems that aren’t located in the office.
3. Not backing up data consistently
The data in your business is always evolving and growing. Therefore, you need to ensure that it is backed up regularly. Because backups take time, there is a higher chance for them to fail. If you only back up once a year without checking, and disaster strikes, you could find that your data is incomplete, inaccessible or out of date. This may make any recovered data essentially useless.
The question is, how often should you back up your data? For most small businesses, a full backup at least once a week is suggested. If you work with client data on a daily basis or if you are in a regulated industry, daily backups would likely be the best plan.
4. Using outdated backup methods
Just because you back up your data doesn’t mean it will always be available, especially if you use older backup methods such as data tapes or disks. Such physical backups can be lost, destroyed in a disaster, or even stolen. You may want to employ a more reliable, modern solution such as cloud backup.
That being said, you don’t have to give up older methods as they can come in handy, especially if you are going to be operating without the Internet for an extended period of time. By employing more than one solution, you can cover all the bases while ensuring that data is backed up and still readily available.
If you are looking to learn more about how you can protect your data, please contact Providence today to see how our systems and solutions can help.
