Backup Anytime

What is an Irish online backup service?
Strictly speaking, an Irish online backup service is one which is based in Ireland and which backs up in Ireland. If you want to be pedantic you would exclude from this list multinational companies with an Irish base or those with no Irish client base.

So now we know what it is why is it so important?
If you are based in Ireland it is very important for a number of reasons

Data availability.
If you have a data communications problem (which often accompanies a data loss scenario) having your data thousands of miles away will not be conducive to rapid restore.

Support (local)
The nearer a supplier is to you (all other things being equal) the greater the support they can and will provide. You may not need much online backup support day to day but this will change when you have an outage and are under serious time constraints.

Support (general)
Most Irish online backup providers are small businesses and offer a very personal level of support. Multinational companies offering online backup commonly offer email only or help desk (web ticket) only support. This type of support may be OK for web hosting or email management but if you have a data loss situation at hand you will want to talk to real people promptly and have the facility for desk-side support and hand holding at every stage of the recovery process. Even if an international provider allows you to skip the ticketing system, a distant and non personal call centre with 99 juniors to 1 unavailable technician is not conducive to rapid, successful restore.

Compliance.
Depending on the legal entity of your organisation and the type of data you use, you may be required to retain your data in Ireland. Seek professional advice before backing up with a non Irish online backup provider if you are not sure.

Shipping.
If you have a large amount of data, a seed install may require shipping of encrypted data. The shorter and less complicated the secured shipment is the better. This may be used more than once as seed restore is not uncommon and is very advantages in a comms outage environment.

Compliance (future)
Data compliance requirements generally is becoming more strict. If you do manage to find an International provider who can somehow (and this is difficult to imagine) provide the same service as someone based in Ireland, there is every possibility that while this may be OK from a compliance perspective now, it could cause compliance issues later. Add to this that moving online backup providers is not as straightforward as changing utilities providers (you will be starting your archive anew with a new supplier) and you can see it is important to get it right from the outset.

We have provided a list of Irish online backup providers for your perusal.