Suppose for a moment that a virus infects your entire computer network. The virus spreads through every employee’s workstation, into every document and database file, or a case of theft or even fire. All your work, all your data—it’s all destroyed.

How would your business recover?

Or do you plan to go out of business for a while until all business data are recreated?

Without an adequate backup and recovery plan, your business is at risk. Because your company relies on its data and other business application that works with database files, the cost of downtime is exorbitant, potentially exceeding millions of naira per hour for such expenses as recovering data and system files, replacing equipment, losing productivity, and losing customers. A recent study reveals the “precarious position” of small business backups: 30% lack formal data backup and storage procedures, 39% review their storage procedures only after a problem occurs, 34% admit to only fair or poor performance in storing backup data offsite, 17% don’t consistently perform incremental data backups, and 55% rate their disaster recovery plan as fair or poor. According to a disaster recovery study, nearly half of the companies that are unable to fully restore their data after a disaster will go out of business entirely. Developing a solid backup plan requires an investment of time and money, but the cost is far less than the burdensome task of recreating data for which no backup exists.


Data Backup Basics
What does it Mean to Back Up, Restore, and Archive Data?
Data backup is the process of transferring data from your company’s primary computer systems to a separate storage device, such as a local secured external hard drive or a secured cloud storage server (Remote Server). If the original data is lost or damaged, you can restore the information from the device and resume normal business operations. An archive is a long-term, permanent data backup, which is kept off-site.

What Types of Files Should Be Backed Up?
The most important files to back up are data files—the files that change on a frequent basis e.g. Database and accounting files, even contract agreement files can be scanned and backed up. Periodically, you should also back up the entire system in case of a catastrophic disaster. This periodic backup should include system files that contain specific user information for customized settings and passwords. You may also want to back up software files if you no longer have the original disks. Our backup software provides the option of backing up all files on the drive, the files that have changed since the last backup, or individually selected files.
How Often Should Data Be Backed Up?
Because data files change every time someone enters new information, many companies back up the data files every day (or only those files that have changed) and then perform a complete backup of the entire system on a weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly basis. For your company, you can determine the necessary frequency of backups by asking yourself how often the data changes and how critical are the different types of data files. In other words, how much data can you afford to lose without causing your business undue hardship?

The best strategy is to devise a schedule that works for the majority of your data files. For example, you can schedule a daily backup of new and modified data files and then a weekly backup of all files. If you have critical files that must be backed up more often, you can back up these files throughout the day.

When Should Backups Take Place?

Ideally, you should back up data after regular business hours when employee demands on the network are at a minimum. This off-hours time frame is called the “backup window.” Most small companies have an adequate backup window to perform backup jobs at night and on weekends.

However, if your business operates 24 hours a day, 7 days a week (24x7), or if you have employees working in different time zones, you may have little or no backup window. In this case, you must determine a time period when employees will be the least affected. Alternatively, our backup software has a “force backup” feature that allows you to backup files even while they are opened and in use without impacting the user community.

Where Should Backup Drive Be Stored?
ExcellentBridge provides two types of backup plans, The On-Site and Cloud (remote) Backup. Either On-Site or Cloud backup or even both may be appropriate for your company.
On-Site Backup
In an On-Site setup, you can copy your data to a second hard drive, other media, or a shared drive, either manually or at specified intervals through our backup software.
With this setup, all the data is within your reach — and therein lies both its value and its risk. You can always access your information when necessary, but that information is vulnerable to loss, whether through theft (someone breaking in and stealing equipment) or damage (such as a leaky water pipe or a natural disaster).


Cloud Backup
In cloud backup, your computer automatically sends your data to a remote data center at specified intervals. To perform a backup, you simply install our backup software (Backup+) on every computer containing data you want to back up, set up a backup schedule, and identify the files and folders to be copied. The software then takes care of backing up the data for you.
With our cloud backup solutions, in the event of a disaster that damaged both your computer data and On-Site backup drives you can still recover your company’s critical data from the remote server.
Automation is another key benefit to cloud backup. A software program won't forget to make an extra copy of a critical folder; a harried employee at the end of a busy week might. By taking the backup task out of your users' hands you avoid the "I forgot" problem.
The main downside to cloud backup solutions is that Internet access is required to fully backup data to the cloud server. If your Internet connection goes down you won't be able to backup or restore from your backups until your Internet connection is restored.
Another potential downside is that you have to entrust critical data to a third party (The remote server vendor).

If you choose to use the On-Site backup plan, you should store one full set of your company’s data on-site for immediate recovery and another copy off-site at a secure location in case your business suffers a fire, theft, or other disaster. Many small companies choose to store backup drives in a safe-deposit box at a local bank or even at the owner’s home. To eliminate the hassle and worry, other companies prefer to use the secured cloud backup solution to keep a copy.

Read more at www.excellentbridge.com/backup

I agree with the author of this post. Most of the companies do not know or even care about the cybersecurity threats that exist today. But with the help of https://spinbackup.com/blog/everything-you-need-to-know-about-office-365-backup-and-recovery-policy-once-and-for-all/ they will learn about Office 365 backup and recovery and much more. Thus, they will know how to protect their business-critical data.