How The Cloud Can Play Its Part in Helping You to Back up Your Company Data When your company data is not backed up, you are putting the future of your business at risk.

The cloud has the potential to enhance the security of companies by helping them to protect their data. But a lot of people either don't have a backup or aren't using the cloud to do it. This represents a serious problem.

When your company data is not backed up, you are putting the future of your business at risk. One security breach and your entire business could disappear. It could take months to get back on track or if you are a new company you may never recover at all.

A survey released by CloudBerry has shined a light on the huge deficiencies when it comes to backups among businesses. The main finding from the survey is that 49 per cent of respondents had only a single copy of their business data.

The evolving cloud has its part to play in resolving this problem, and this article is going to make you aware of it.

What the Survey Showed

CloudBerry is a company setup in 2008 with the direct purpose of delivering backup and file management services to small and medium-sized businesses via the cloud. They are worried about the state of businesses in all industries and the fact that a third of their survey's respondents had a lax or dismissive attitude to backups.

Along with the big number given above, an equal number of people (36%) said that they either had no backups at all or had backed up their business data completely, and they did it multiple times. This is encouraging, but at the same time it's depressing. People have not even got as far as backing up at all, let alone moving to the cloud.

People are Not Using the Cloud

The fact is that there are too many people who are backing up their data not using the cloud. 44% of people in the survey said that they are using external drives for backup purposes. The most common form of external drive was the tape drive. Compare this to only 26% of people who said they were using the cloud.

So why are only some small firms shifting to the cloud?

62% of people said that they are concerned with the level of security provided by the cloud. They are not completely sold on the idea of using the cloud because they claim there are no guarantees on the security of their data.

The other main concerns regarding the cloud revolved around the initial work in uploading all business data to the cloud in the first instance and being locked into the same vendor for a prolonged period of time.

Why External Drives are the Wrong Answer

Although people pointed out security concerns as the biggest reason for not using the cloud, this logic is flawed. External drives provide an even bigger security concern. They can be both easily destroyed by natural disasters or they can be stolen. These are far more likely scenarios than someone managing to hijack the cloud. In fact, the average lifespan of an external hard drive is less than five years.

Another reason why external drives are the wrong answer is that they are prone to human error. There's no telling what can happen when a tired employee accidentally overwrites a file or makes an unintended deletion. This wouldn't happen with the cloud because there are security features in place to prevent this from happening.

How the Cloud Can Play Its Part

The cloud has so many more advantages over more conventional forms of backup. These are five of the main ways that the cloud can play its part in enabling companies to back their data up in a more efficient and superior way.

• You can access data on the cloud from anywhere. This gives businesses more flexibility because they are not restricted by geography. You can pull up files whenever you like. In terms of disaster recovery, this provides a far superior turnaround.
• Keeping backed up files on the cloud in a different geographical location provides you with more security in the event of major theft or a natural disaster.
• Simplicity. Contrary to what a lot of people think, the cloud is simple to use. Advanced cloud solutions provided by companies like CloudBerry has made it easier than ever before to upload your data to the cloud and to make regular backups. Much of the process is automated.
• The automation options common to the cloud allows you to continuously protect your business without the need for constant input on your part.
• Most importantly of all is the affordability factor. The cloud is available to even the smallest of companies because there's a package to suit everybody. You can spend just a few hundred dollars annually in order to be completely covered.

Conclusion

The results of this survey have made it clear that now is the time for small businesses to make the most of the cloud. Companies are alarmingly vulnerable, even though many of them have taken the step of using external drives. But it's not enough. Only by migrating to the cloud can you be secure.

How will you protect yourself today?