Business Backup: Our Top Tips

There are generally two kinds of business, those who have lost data and those who will!

To make sure you are not in either of those camps and you are safe in the knowledge that your data is safe, make sure you have your backups set up and running regularly.

Regular backups can be one of the most important steps that you can take to prevent your business suffering a data disaster.

These should happen in addition to your cybersecurity (you remember, we talked about this in the last blog) and mean that you have secure and clean data to keep the business running in the case of a data loss.

There are so many ways that data can be lost. Computers get damaged, accidents happen, personnel changes. A data backup plan has to be part of your business operations, no matter the size of your business.

Here are our top tips:

Back up three ways

Back up your data, internally, externally, and remotely. Internally means the data backup is on your own server, an external backup sees the data stored on external or removable hard drives and remotely refers to cloud storage.

Protect your data with Encryption

All of your stored data should be protected, one way to do this is through encryption. This keeps your data safe and means that even if a hacker breaks into your computer systems the data will be of no use without the proper key to decrypt said data.

Best practices for backup frequency

There are set rules for how often your data should be backed up. Some businesses back up every few minutes, some every few hours and some every day. It really depends on the amount of data you are handling. Your IT team or provider will be able to offer you advise on the right frequency for you.

Test, test and test again

You need to test your restore process so that you know how it works. So many businesses vigilantly back up their data but never test how to restore it. Your tapes could be corrupt, your files not backed up correctly and then where would your business be. Schedule in regular tests to make sure that you can access your backed up data.

Of course if you need a hand with any of this, give us a call, Dolphin works with businesses of all sizes to manage their data back ups and give them the peace of mind that their data is backed up and stored safely and securely.