Choosing a Backup Solution to Protect Data for the Small Business
Computer problems and data losses happen, but good backup systems can protect you. Every day your employees spend hours working at their computers and sooner or later, some, or potentially all, of that work may be lost. Often this is just a small amount, a deleted email or a small file, but a catastrophic equipment failure could to lead to the loss of all of your data. Backing up your data is a task that every business owner should take seriously. The good news is that once a backup system is in place, regular, comprehensive backups can be handled relatively easily.
There are four primary ways that data can become lost and unrecoverable: user deletion, catastrophic hardware failure, virus infection or damage, and loss of encryption passwords.
User Deletion of Files and Information
User Deletion is by far the most common reason that a backup is needed; someone simply makes a mistake and deletes a file. Sometimes the file itself is not deleted, but information is changed and the original information is lost. For example, incorrect changes to your accounts receivables system might be difficult to correct without a recent copy to review. It can be frustrating and expensive to ask staff to recreate a significant portion of their work if it is lost. The solution is to make sure you include everything in your backups, back it up regularly, and retain some of your backups for long periods of time.
Catastrophic Hardware Failure Can Cause Data Loss
Catastrophic hardware failure such as a hard drive that no longer works is fairly common. Less common, but equally damaging are fires, floods, water damage, lightening, and theft. The only practical way for a small business to protect against a catastrophic failure is to create backups often and keep them off site.
Viruses Can Infect Your Computers and Damage Data
Antivirus systems are not perfect, and no matter how sophisticated your software and how often you update it, they cannot guarantee absolute protection of your data. Even worse, a problem with the antivirus system may be responsible for corrupting or deleting your data if the file is mistakenly identified as infected. Malicious hackers might be able to access your system and do as much or more damage as an invasive virus. The solution is to keep backups on removable media. If your backup is not connected to the computer, hackers and viruses cannot get to it.
Lost Encryption Passwords Can Result in Inaccessible Data
Encryption passwords, tokens, or keys, are often used to keep the wrong people from reading files if they are stolen. There are many encryption methods available, and encryption is a recommended practice for personal, financial, or medical information that must be stored on a laptop or other mobile devices. The key to using encryption is to make sure that your access method is backed up in addition to the actual file so that you cannot lock yourself out of your own data. Setting up an encryption program is effective but often requires the assistance of professional help.
Backing up Your Data – The Basics
A solution that works well for small businesses, is to simply backup everything by creating a full backup. Unfortunately, by simply selecting “everything” to be backed up, some items such as open files are often missed. If a file is in use and the system cannot get a lock on it, it is considered open and the file will be skipped by the backup. Active Directory, email systems, and databases are considered open files and will require special consideration for backing up. The best way to protect this type of data is to purchase a backup solution that deals specifically with open files, databases, or e-mail files. An alternative way is to make sure that workstations, databases, or email servers are shut down and no one can access the system while the backup runs. This alternative is often impractical in all but the smallest networks.
Full backups are the most complete and the easiest to restore. They do, however, take the most time to create, and require the most space on your backup media. Differential backups on the other hand, will only back up anything that has changed since the last full backup. These backups are typically fast, and do not store a lot of data because only changed files are saved. When restoring a differential backup, you must first restore the original full backup, then the differential. For this reason, you should still create a full backup at regular intervals.
If at all possible centralize all critical data on a server for easy backup. If your organization does not have a server, one workstation can be used as a backup as if it were a server.
Once you have enough data that it does not easily fit on your backup media you may have to choose whether you need to include all data on every backup or whether you will need to upgrade your backup device.
How Often Should You Back Up Your Data?
You should back up often enough to be able to afford any lost data between backups. A common plan is to run a backup every night that your business is open. That way, if you do have a problem, you only risk one day’s worth of data at a time. For example, if you can easily replace a day’s worth of work, but replacing a weeks worth of work would be too expensive and time consuming, backing up daily is a good choice.
How Long Should You Keep a Backup?
Backups should be kept for as long as you will need the data. For example, if you save a file that will be needed next tax season, then that is how long the backup should be kept. Suppose a user accidentally deletes your file, you have it backed up on tapes that you rotate Monday thru Friday, but you don’t notice it was deleted until you need it, long after your Monday thru Friday tapes have been overwritten with backups that don’t include your deleted file. A better retention plan is to have a daily tape for Monday thru Friday and a set of a dozen monthly tapes that you run on the first business day of each month. This simple example is not perfect, but it is cost-effective and there is a very good chance that the file you need to retrieve later will be stored on a backup.
Where Should You Keep Your Backups?
To protect against catastrophic failure, backups must be stored off site. Transporting backup media to a secure, protected location every day would be ideal, but is not often done because of the time it takes. Any backups that remain on site should be kept in a fire proof box located as far from the server as possible. A fireproof box will probably not save digital media in the event of an actual fire but fireproof boxes are heavy, difficult to steal, and lockable. It is important to lock or encrypt your backups because taking a backup is an easy way to steal personal, financial, or medical data. It is often easier for a thief to simply walk out the door with a backup tape than trying to break in through your firewall from the internet. Backups are supposed to be a protection for you rather than a risk, so make sure they are protected from theft.
How Will You Recover Data From a Backup?
One consideration in how you will recover your data is how fast you need to recover it. It is relatively simple to recover individual files once the correct backup media is located or retrieved from off site storage. Recovering an entire system from a catastrophic failure is much more difficult. Usually the process begins with replacing hardware, installing operating systems and programs, configuring all your settings, and then restoring your data. This process will go much smoother if all of your hardware information, programs, license codes, and settings are kept off site in paper format along with your backup media.
Images or bare metal backups will speed this process even more. This type of backup will restore to a completely empty set of new hardware and includes everything you need to get up and running. Re-establishing your system from an image can often have a server running in a matter of hours, instead of days.
Using CDs or DVDs for Backups
CDs or DVDs are the cheapest option for small amounts of data and are portable, making off site storage easy. They are not often used as a comprehensive backup solution because much of the backup software available will not recognize CD or DVD burners as valid backup devices, the shelf life of CDs or DVDs is not as long as other options, the size of storage is limited, and it is difficult to automate the backup using CDs or DVDs. They are good for storing data that you are removing from your system to use later for reference only. Make two copies of all data that you are removing from your system. Keep one copy on site for easy access and the other off site.
Using Tape for Backups
Magnetic tapes are the workhorses of backup media. Tapes are a good choice because this media is cost-effective, portable, can hold large amounts of data, and works well with backup software making backups easy to automate. The tape drives and the backup software to go with them, however, are somewhat expensive. A tape drive, media, and installation for a small business using the built-in Windows backup will usually run about $1,500 for 40 GB of data backed up. Add software with some additional features and increase the capacity to 250 GB of data and you maybe looking at spending closer to $4,500. While this may seem like a lot, the cost of the tapes themselves is low for the amount of data they will hold, and they are designed to have a long shelf life because they will be used again and again.
Using Removable Hard Drives for Backups
In recent years, removable hard drives have become cheap which makes them appealing to use for backups. We do not recommend removable hard drives as a single backup solution as they must be attached to the server, are not easily portable, do not usually have a good shelf life, and can be quite expensive if you need more than a few of them to rotate for off site storage. The good news is, that like tapes, they work well with backup software, so the software agents, automation, and advanced recovery options are available with removable hard drives used for backups. External hard drives work very well for storing images or bare metal backups. They are also good solutions for temporary backups used to move data to a new system, or hold data while a system is rebuilt.
Backing Up Your Data to an Online Service
Internet-based solutions are now available as well. There are many vendors and levels of service offered, but the basic idea is that you pay a company to store your data off site via an internet connection. Many of these companies are very good and can give you some enterprise-class options. If managing backups is consuming too much staff time, this may be the way to go. There is no media to deal with, they will review your logs, and they will call you if there are problems. Good internet-based solutions are not inexpensive, however. In addition to paying for the service, you will need an internet connection that is fast enough to transfer your data to the off site server. You will need encryption to protect your data which is often provided by the vendor, but may incur additional charges, and you will be charged by the amount of data you store, as well as the amount of data you change on a regular basis. Another issue to consider before choosing an internet-based solution is how you will restore data if you need to. Some companies allow you to do this yourself, others require that you call them for assistance. Some will overnight a set of DVDs with all of your data if you request it, others will require that you download your entire backup to restore your system from a catastrophe. Internet-based backup solutions are rapidly changing within the market and are worth evaluating if you do not already own an adequate tape solution or want a cost-effective, professionally-managed solution for a small amount of data.
How Will You Know If the Backup System Works?
There’s no way around it. You have to test your system on a regular basis. Even if the backup software says that it completed a backup, the only way to know whether you can get data back off the media is to try to restore your system from the backup. While a complete system restore is not practical for periodic testing purposes, you should pick a few files and restore them each month in order to test your backup system. Most backup software will allow you to restore the files to an alternate location, so you will not need to overwrite your current files in order to conduct a test. You should consider testing restores of databases, e-mail, and, if spare hardware is available, a complete system restore.
Put Some Prevention Measures in Place to Secure Your Data
Backup systems are not complete until you put prevention measures in place to keep from losing data in the first place. Battery backups, redundant server hardware, hard drives known as RAID arrays, and locked air conditioned server rooms that are not likely to flood, all will help prevent catastrophic equipment failure and data loss. Locking down file permissions and user access, as well as good staff training will help prevent user-deleted files. A desktop security suite will help save systems from viruses and a professionally installed encryption system will help keep hackers at bay while making sure you can access your data. A comprehensive disaster recovery plan is a must if you want to be back up and running should you encounter a natural disaster, fire, or water damage. Each of these elements will help protect your business from data loss.
Backup System Checklist
· Identify the data that needs protecting
· Identify the possible risks to that data
· Minimize risks to your data if possible
· Determine if software agents are needed
· Identify how often it needs backing up
· Determine when the backups will happen
· Determine how long to archive backups
· Determine how fast you need it restored
· Determine what you will need to restore it
· Decide where you will store the backups
· Decide who will be responsible for maintenance
· Keep records or backup logs
· Test your backups to make sure they work
· Seek Professional help when needed
J.P. Schwartz, Inc. can provide professional review, installation, training, and testing of your backup solution. Professional help is the best way to get piece of mind where backups are concerned. Our engineers have worked with many organizations and backup solutions; we can work with you to provide a backup solution that's right for your business and your budget. We can save you time and money when it comes to backing up your data and help to ensure that when data is lost, for whatever reason, you will be able to recover it quickly.
If you are ready to take the steps necessary to protect your computers and your vital business information from accidental deletions, hardware failures, destructive viruses or hackers, give the Backup Solutions experts at J.P. Schwartz a call today at (303) 482-1242 or contact us by e-mail at info@jpschwartz.com. Our local offices are located in the Boulder Colorado and Denver Colorado metropolitan areas; we consult for companies nationwide.
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