What Small Business Owner Should Know about Data Loss and Data Backup

The Cost of Lost Data is Substantial for Businesses

Home computer users are familiar with the consequence of wrongly deleting some files and emptying the entire Recycle Bin. However, the nature of the lost data for a company is far much severe than that. The cost of losing important business data and files is too high that businesses must be proactive in protecting the digital resource. A saying is appropriate here: prevention is better than cure.

The Causes of Data Loss

Both computer hardware failure and software-related errors are possible to result in data loss. According to an online survey on data loss, hardware failure, such as hard drive issues and power surges, is the top direct cause of all data loss incidents. A human error like but not limited to accidental deletion of files is the second biggest hidden danger for data security. The third biggest reason for digital data loss is the accidental physical damage done to the computer hardware.

What is worth noticing, the damage caused by a software diagnostic program and computer virus (including the resident virus, file infecting virus, malware infection) is the fourth biggest factor that leads to data loss. Businessmen and business owners usually use the computer for a long time every day. They could become the victim of a computer virus when they open a suspicious link in the email, visit an unsafe website, click on a link to subscribe to a newsletter, etc. Hackers usually target companies because they try to steal sensitive, valuable business data or send blackmail in the form of a ransom note. In fact, theft of laptops and physical hardware destruction only accounts for a very small percent of all data loss incidents in the survey.

Why is Making Data Backup So Important for Companies?

The risks of data loss exist in any type of business and can strike at any time. However, some small business owners fail to realize that the lack of an adequate data backup can cause a domino effect of disastrous consequences. First of all, productivity gets suffered immediately when your organization loses its data due to malicious cyber-attack, computer hardware, or software failure. Second, you will need to use software such as MiniTool Power Data Recovery to recover the lost files or seek assistance from professionals to get the problem fixed after several hours or even days. What’s worse, if the confidential business information and client data are lost from negligence or theft, that will do not only bring economic impacts on your company but also do harm to customer trust.

Data security and file backup should not be taken lightly by businesses. A good file backup process needs to be automated, up to date, and secure. Ideally, the business owner and the data security manager should be able to know how the data backup process works, how long it takes to finish the business back up, and how to restore all the data if a digital disaster happens. Perform a suitable data backup strategy and use the right tools, you can protect your business data.

The first step is to consider your company’s backup needs. Do you need the tool to quickly restore data? Do you need a backup for the databases, files, Windows OS, applications, and configurations? Are your company’s data loss risks high?

The second step is evaluating options to find a backup strategy that best fits your company. There are many different methods for businesses to backup data, ranging from cloud-based solutions to software. Here you will find the advantages of each, as well as where they fall short.

1. Cloud-Based Backups

For businessmen and enterprises, it is common to back data using cloud-based solutions because they are easy to use and affordable. If you decide to purchase a cloud-based service, you’d better select the small business support option to get in touch with an actual human. However, cloud services are not suitable for companies to back up sensitive, confidential data.

2. Hardware Backups

Hardware, such as local hard drives or the hard drives on the network will the backup process quick and straightforward. However, you should make sure that the hardware won’t fail to function, otherwise, the data stored in the device stands the risk of losing all data. For that reason, most companies prefer to use a combination of hardware backup and software backup, or hardware backup and cloud-based solutions.

3. Software Backups

In most cases, software solutions are less expensive than other backup options, for example, MiniTool ShadowMaker. They may require you to install the software on your system or on a virtual machine, which is literally an electronic version of a computer. So you do not have to purchase a separate server for it.

4. Hybrid Backups

Hybrid backup combines the hardware backup plan and cloud services. This method works in sync with your hard drive to schedule automated backups of the data stored on the drive. To keep your data secure, the data is encrypted as it is backed up. The advantage of a hybrid service is that you will have on-site backups and can get your data from the cloud if necessary.

The third step is testing your new backup system to ensure that the backup process is successful and the restoration process goes without a hitch. At last, you could create a testing schedule, for instance, you need to do a complete test of your backup once a month, and schedule additional tests after you change some data. That will make sure the data you want to protect will always be there when you need them later.

Hardware malfunction, formatting errors, employee carelessness, and ransomware attacks are very likely to put the business data at risk. It wouldn’t be overreaching to say that every business should have at least one reliable method of data backup. While you cannot predict when data loss will happen, you can make sure your business has a secure backup system and give you the peace of mind you need to recover your data.

This article does not necessarily reflect the opinions of the editors or management of EconoTimes