Backup Anytime

Business person without data protection today! Donkey!

Want to continue in business? Get business continuity.

All the talk these days is based around the global credit crisis, recession, future outlook and financial opinion. It would appear that one persons opinion is as likely to be wrong or right than that of any other. The abiding consensus among business people who by their nature tend to be optimists is that the good times will come back. Sounds hopeful? Yes, but it is also something that is likely to be proved right in time as was the previous vision of meltdown provided by economists.

These people in the main therefore want to continue in business. They better get business continuity in place. The better ones will. Business continuity is essential for many reasons including and not exclusive to data compliance, client protection, data availability and indeed business survival.

So, what must one do. In a nutshell (and that is all this post is) you need to ensure that the data you retain passes the following criteria.

Permissible : You must ensure you have the right to retain data regardless of format.

Backed up : In addition to ensuring that data does not get in to the wrong hands you must also ensure that it remains available to you.

Protected : You must take adequate measures to ensure that any access to this data is appropriate and by appropriate persons. Do not confuse this with backup. Just because you retain a copy of data does not mean it is safe from unauthorised persons.

Revised : Data store compliance needs to be managed. Any data which you held with permission and rights last month may not be yours to use today.

Destroyed. You must remove data before it passes it’s appropriate usage date. Simple deletion is not actual deletion. A simple delete function merely tells the system, to mark the data as not required should hard drive space become needed. Modern drive sizes dictate that in many cases this rarely or never happens. You could be shocked and more seriously affected by the amount of supposedly deleted data which could be retrieved with minimal effort from your systems.

Managed : All of these factors need to be managed in conjunction with each other. This may require software, hardware and outside assistance. Most regions and many industries also require the appointment of a data protection officer. In small business environments this is generally someone with other existing tasks.

Sounds expensive? It need not be.

Sounds like a requirement? Yes (with variances on requirement level depending on location and industry)

Sounds urgent? Now is a good time. Anytime after a data outage is too late.

Sound important? How would your clients feel if they felt the data you have relating to them was not protected? Not to mention the consequences of it becoming public as a consequence of your non compliance.

Sounds scary? No soundbites or frighteners here. This is reality.

Want to take action?

Contact backupantime today and speak in absolute confidence with Ireland’s favourite online backup providers.