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A remote or online backup solution is the way forward for off-site data protection. Due to regulatory compliance some corporations are holding back from going to this direction, however, much work is being made in this area and soon we have providers that will provide such conformity. On the other hand, the majority of SMBs that have no specific regulatory requirements and certainly most households should consider this platform as their main off-site backup solution.

Nevertheless, SMBs and households should not forget to backup their data locally first and then use a remote storage location as a second means of protection - my advice is:

 

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Are online backup and recovery solutions cheaper than the counterpart traditional solutions? Before I deal with this argument I would like to point out a few points: – online backups provide an offsite disaster recovery solution, you can access your data from anywhere given that you have an internet connection and additionally, you will be enjoying the expertise and the scalability of big vendors.

Online backups offer cheaper costs per GB for the same functionality because you only pay for what you use. The costs include the storage used, bandwidth consumed and other related services. Data security is based on the latest encryption algorithms and adequate auditing features would place the end-user’s mind at rest!

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With today’s inexpensive and large-sized disk drives, disk-to-disk backups have become the default choice for many SMBs! However, off-site backup procedures require the use of tapes and hence, the use of related peripherals such as tape drives. Traditional backup methodologies bring along the need for more storage space and a sharp increase in operational costs! Although, data archives and off-site backups have their advantages, and are a must when meeting compliance regulations they must adhere to more rigid safeguards such as, encryption mechanisms and safe storage. Adequate drills need to be put in place to test recovery procedures on regular basis. Traditional methods create data duplication. To eliminate duplication of data, various methods and applications were created which are known as data de-duplication. Data de-duplication improves data protection, increases the speed of service, and reduces costs.

Why online backups are the way forward – because they provide:

1. User friendly backup/restore applications
2. Native off-site and archival services
3. Reduce secondary storage requirements through data de-duplication concepts
4. Intelligent data transfer methods through hashing algorithms
5. Safe – same data protection means such as, encrypted storage and connection
6. Scalability for future growth
7. Cheaper TCO (total cost of ownership)
8. Introduce pay-per-use concepts
9. Data retrieval anywhere-anytime concepts

The following are a couple of flash animations to demonstrate how online backups function. I’ll add more animations to cover different scenarios soon.

RSync: The first time a file is transfered

RSync: What happens when the source file changes.

You may not know Sgt Troy Dally; you probably never attended Pastor Michael Guisande sermons; Cassie Bond is probably not listed as a friend on your Facebook, MySpace or Hi5 page and 21 year old Mark Leatham rings no bell. These are four people who have had their computer stolen. Troy’s laptop computer and external hard disk were in a backpack that went missing; Pastor Guisande’s computer was stolen from his church; Cassie and Mark suffered a similar predicament.

These people did not have any military sensitive information on their computers; they didn’t even have the personal details of members of their local soccer club or church choir. They didn’t make the headlines because the value of their desktop or notebook computer was gynormous. Pastor Michael lost 20 years of sermons;  Troy’s laptop and external hard disk contained photos he had taken while serving in Iran as well as digital images of his house which burned down while he was away in Iran; Cassie’s home computer held the last photos she had taken of her dad before he died; Mark’s notebook contained the last photos of his mum who died after suffering from a rare degenerative condition called Pompe disease.

It’s not the cost of replacing the computer that bothers these people; some have even stated that they would be happy to get the contents of their computer back and have promised that if someone hands them a DVD or the notebook’s hard disk with their personal stuff they would not ask any questions. Their personal stuff is worthless to anyone else. Cassie summed it up by stating that “It’s really distressing to know that someone could just wipe all that off and sell it for money”.

These are four of the hundreds of computer thefts that take place every day of the year. These people don’t live in a bad neighborhood; they come from Australia, England, United States, and every country that has computers and crime. Had these people had a Remote Backup solution they would not have found it necessary to become one of the pages of a newspaper. A Remote Backup account allows you to backup your important files over the internet at lightening speed. The number of backups one can take is unlimited. Irrespective of whatever happens to the computer sitting in your backpack or on a desk at home, your data will never cease to exist. Remote Backups turn a disaster into a minor inconvenience.

In a connected world Remote Backups are something we cannot live without.

Last week I decided to unpack yet another box I had carried over to my new house almost a year ago. The thing with the last remaining boxes is that these contain the non essential bits and pieces, the memorabilia and stuff that was either passed down to me or which was prevalent in my life many years ago. Opening these boxes isn’t an act of simply unpacking and sorting stuff but one of reminiscing through my and my ancestry’s past. This box contained photos taken during the 60s and 70s. And I always thought that only punk rockers had funny hair styles!

Up to the advent of digital photography, taking a photo was a costly process. Even though one could purchase relatively cheap cameras, the cost of film and the development of the same were such that taking a photo would be a planned event for many people. Since each photo carried its own cost, a photo would be discarded only if it was horribly wrong. A photo with half of Aunt Lucy missing or Uncle Bertrand being slightly blurred would be retained and would be passed around on those infrequent family gatherings when old photos would be passed around.

Today we live in the digital era. Ones and zeroes have replaced paper and chemicals. Cameras are cheap and even the cheapest models have sufficient functionality built in to make anyone a respectable photographer.  It is becoming impossible to get a blurred, overexposed or underexposed photo. Who knows, someday we will be asked to pay for some of these retro functionalities! Now-a-days when taking a photo we keep on recording one shot after another until we get the one we are happy with. All we have to do is delete the ones we do not want and eventually transfer everything to a folder on our computer.

Yet will a digital photo of Uncle Bertrand taken today be available to someone in 40 years time? The answer is a probable no. Your hard disk in your home computer will fail sooner or later, the notebook on which you keep all your photos will suffer a fall, get stolen or lost and maybe a virus or component failure will wipe away all the data on your computer. Even CD and DVD-ROMs have a shelf life after which the manufacturer no longer guarantees the readability of data.

Taking regular and repeated backups of your computer’s important files is the only way to ensure that someone will be able to comment on your hairstyle somewhere down the line. Fast online backups to offsite servers ensure not only that you are backing up the things that matter to you but also that you are safeguarding against losses as a result of fire, flood, and theft.

Go on, let others have a good laugh at you – protect your data by taking a backup.