In today’s world, businesses gather, analyze and process large volumes of digital data on an everyday basis. From identifying common customer behavior to creating campaigns that target the right audience, business data plays a critical role in the everyday functioning of a company. Considering the critical need for data, businesses cannot afford to lose their data at any cost. However, data loss is quite common owing to various factors such as natural disasters, human errors, security breaches and more. If you expect your business to continue operations even after a catastrophic data loss, cloud-based data backup is the best option for you.

Since threats to business data have skyrocketed in this new remote working age, the need for the cloud to be a part of the backup solution has become extremely important for businesses of all sizes. According to Microsoft, 94 percent of businesses report security benefits after moving their data and services to the cloud. This is the main reason why organizations have started embracing cloud technology at a dramatic phase.

This short read will provide you with some key insights about the importance of cloud backup remote working environments and how you can bolster your cybersecurity with a proper cloud strategy.

Need for Cloud Backup During Remote Work

It’s one thing to lose your data during a cyberattack or another unexpected event, but losing your integrity and goodwill is a completely different ballgame. All the years of hard work you invested in building your company will be in jeopardy if you suffer a loss of customer data. When your customers have no reason to trust you, they will simply take their business elsewhere rather than waiting for you to bounce back. Whether it is an ordinary human error or a deliberate cyberattack, the risk of losing your critical data is significantly higher when your employees are working remotely.

The 2020 User Risk Report by Proofpoint has estimated that about 45 percent of employees in the United States believe that public Wi-Fi networks are safe for work. When you don’t control the environment in which your employees operate, the risk is much higher, and stands as an indication for you to take the right data security measures.

Security solutions such as antivirus, firewall, patching, etc., can only get you so far. What if there is a manual oversight or a natural disaster? Human error also plays a big role in many security breach incidents. In such situations, the survival of your business depends on your ability to bounce back fast with the help of backed up data. This is why you need a business continuity and disaster recovery solution through cloud-based data backups.

Best Practices for Cloud Backup

When you use the 3-2-1 backup rule, cloud storage inevitably becomes a part of your backup strategy. As per this rule, you make three copies of your data, store two copies on different media (e.g: hard drive and local storage appliance) and store one copy off-site in the form of cloud backup. You may also expand this rule by storing multiple copies of your data in different cloud locations.

Apart from the data storage rule, the following best practices could guide you with your backup planning:

• Know your recovery objectives: In case of data failure, you need to know how quickly you can recover before your losses become irrecoverable (Recovery Time Objective) and how much data can you afford to lose from your last backup time (Recovery Point Objective). This helps you come up with a solid plan that ensures business continuity and disaster recovery.
• Prioritize your data: Businesses store all kinds of data every day. But which data is critical to your business recovery? Your backup plan should prioritize that first and then proceed with other data. A good cloud backup plan should outline different strategies for different kinds of data.
• Monitor your backup process: What’s worse than losing your data during a data loss event? Finding out that the backup data you have diligently stored is corrupted. You don’t want to be in such a position, especially after a catastrophic data loss. You need to monitor your backup process to make sure your backup operations are carried out without a glitch.
• Test your backup and recovery: Testing is a great way to ensure everything works as planned when disaster strikes. Testing is a great way to identify the issues in your backup process and should be a part of your regular backup plan.
• Backup your SaaS data: Your G Suite and Office 365 data is secure. However, there is a misconception that these don’t need any backups. Although your SaaS vendors are responsible for providing the backup infrastructure, they do not guarantee the safety of your data or take accountability for any financial losses resulting from it. Make sure your backup plan has a strategy for your SaaS data as well.

Partnering With a Reliable Cloud Backup Provider

With the volume of critical data increasing every day, businesses often face challenges in protecting this data from unauthorized access. Cloud backup is the best way to ensure that critical data is always available in case of an unexpected disaster.

Apart from ensuring data security, cloud storage can also make your backup process more efficient and cost-effective. To make the most of your cloud storage benefits, you need to have a trusted partner who you can rely on when things go south.

This is where we come in. Our years of expertise in data backup and cloud storage can help you protect your business data in an incredibly effective way. Give us a call today and find out how we can help build your cloud backup plan.

Article curated and used by permission.

Data sources:

• Office 365 Driving Growth Together: Small businesses and the cloud

Proofpoint 2020 User Risk Report