Security is a major concern for modern day organizations. Disaster can strike anytime from anywhere. And by disaster we don't mean a typhoon or floods but also a hacker attack, virus attack or a crash of network. Big organizations in current times rely on data to edge out their competitors. Any loss of data can prove to be a fatal blow for the company. Hence, backing up data periodically is a process followed religiously by these companies. The best data backup system is the priority item for most CEO's, CTO's and CIO's.
There are software backup solutions and hardware backup solutions. Software data backup solutions involve a program which runs at regular intervals. It copies a programmed defined of data and burns CDs or DVDs thereby ensuring that the critical data is now available on storage. In the event of hard disk crashing, you can always refer to the backup CDs or DVDs.
However, companies have data which run into terra bytes. Hence burning the CDs and DVDs which have comparatively lesser capacity is not a easy task. The number of CDs and DVDs will run into hundreds. Labeling and maintaining them is additional task. Soon you will develop a new library of discs and have hassles of maintaining the library.
RAID 1 configuration disks are another option for data back up, in which cases data is stored in different physical locations to facilitate hassle-free data recovery.
Hard disk image copying is a secure cost effective solution. The image of the hard disk is copied as a back up of the data on the original hard disk. If you need to recover the backed up data, you simply have to run the image driver and all your data will be once again available in the same structure as you had previously.
Apart from the above method, Online data backup is another popular way of taking data back up.
Online data backup also means setting up a backup at a remote host server. This set ups involve a separate set up servers whose primary task is to act as back up for your production servers. Data from the production servers are sent to these back up server set. Data is usually sent over a private wide area network. This network is made secure by using various authentication and authorization techniques. Specialized software are used for online back up. If required, this software would also encrypt data like personal information before sending it over the network. You then have option to save the encrypted data on your back up servers or decrypt it before storing. If you store it as encrypted format, its critical that you also have backup of the decryption logic on some secure machine. Individuals and small businesses might find this complex and expensive method. For them, their are a host of freeware solutions. For example, G: drive lets you use the free email space offered by Goggle as an online backup space. But beware: Goggle does not guarantee you anything for the GMail account, so you are better off with a professional backup service provider.
There are quite a few services that offer online data backup. Data Deposit Box (datadepositbox.com), Connected Data Protector (Connected.com), First Backup (Firstbackup.com), I Backup (ibackup.com), X Drive (Xdrive.com) are the main players in online data backup solutions. There is difference in functionality. With some, data encryption and transfer is real fast while for others, the initial speed is pathetic. Again, Internet browsing speed is superb with some and for others it is nothing more than poor.
If you don’t consider online data back up, consider implementing a routine backup program. You can use a separate computer hard drive only for back up. If your data volume is small, then even CDs or DVDs can help. A major and common blunder people do is keeping the backup in the same location as the original data. In case of a natural disaster like hurricane or floods, the premise would be destroyed and along with that your original and backup data too. So always store your back up data at a physical location which is far then the location of the original data. Most of the companies which have online business maintain a mirror site which is the exact replica of the original. If the original site gets hit by a disaster, the mirror site can immediately take the center stage and the business as usual continues.
A backup solution is as critical as the original data storage solution. Neglect of such disaster recovery systems is in itself inviting disaster yourself.