Don’t Be An April Fool. Backup Your Data.
March 31st is World Backup Day. This event is a reminder for you to have a second copy of your files, including documents, photos, and emails. Rather than storing this data just in one place, such as your computer, you would also keep copies on a separate storage device and/or on a cloud service.
Youngstown State University student Ismail Jadun started World Backup Day in 2011. He and other Reddit commenters discussed the need for backups. After that, Jadun decided the best day for World Backup Day is the day before April Fools’ Day. Since then, this awareness day grew throughout the IT industry and the corporate world.
How can you lose your data?
- Theft/loss
- Hardware failure
- Cyber-attacks (virus, malware, denial of service)
- User error
- Power outage
- Natural disasters
Are you backing up your data?
Here are some scary statistics to consider from World Backup Day:
- 21% of people have never made a backup
- 113 phones are lost or stolen every minute
- 29% of data loss cases are caused by accident
- 30% of all computers are already infected with malware
How can you protect your data?
World Backup Day recommends these backup methods for business and personal use:
- Online Backup Services: The cloud provides an alternative storage method to using physical devices. After that, to get access to the files, users can log in to an online account.
- External Hard Drive Backup: You can use these devices for data storage and PC backups. However, the equipment is subject to damage and loss. Therefore, we recommend using this method in conjunction with online backup services.
- Computer Backup: PC operating systems like Windows have a function that allows you to back up files to another drive. For example, this can be an external hard drive or a cloud service. After that, Windows can restore files in case of loss, theft, or damage.
- Smartphone Backup: Do not rely on just the phone’s default cloud service (such as iCloud) for storing images and documents. For instance, if a hacker accesses your account, you can lose all these files. Therefore, we recommend using a second cloud storage service for these critical files, such as Dropbox.
- NAS Backup: Stands for Network Attached Storage. This connects to a corporate or home network so you and other authorized users can access its files from anywhere on any device. Consequently, we recommend this type of backup for smaller businesses and individual power users.
If you have questions regarding your existing backup practices, you may contact SwiftTech Solutions at 877-794-3811 or info@swifttechsolutions.com.
Our team can provide backup services that can fit your organizational requirements and budget. We can backup data only in our economical Backup as a Service (BaaS) package. Or we can roll out a full-service option called Disaster Recovery as a Service (DRaaS) that backs up entire systems, including applications, servers, and email platforms.
Note: SwiftTech Solutions originally published this blog in March 2018 and updated it for accuracy and comprehensiveness.