Beware of These Three Important Factors About Internet Backup

This article is not intended to scare you away from using online backup, but it is intended to educate you about potential risks that come with a cloud backup solution, so you can eventually choose the right vendor and have a good experience with your chosen provider.

During the early days of internet backup, many people were skeptical about its security. Storing files on CD’s/ DVDs, tapes or external hard drives were still the main backup method, but today, massive technology advancement has significantly changed how people backup their files and documents.

Online backup has now become a mainstream method, and thousands of companies worldwide now integrate online backup in their backup procedure.

The issue of data security:

When you send your data to your provider’s server, there are opportunities for hackers to access your data. If your provider does not use at least 128-bit encryption technology, the chances of hackers stealing your data increase significantly.

To prevent this, you should find a provider that is willing to explain their security practices to keep your data secure. Using high level encryption algorithms and hosting the servers in a secure environment are two basic indications that a provider is reliable.

Avoid internet backup providers that do not want to explain about their security measures.

Data privacy

Do you know that some online backup providers can take a look at your data? Perhaps it is a curious employee snooping around, or law enforcement officers who force providers to hand over files stored in the servers.

Although you may not store any information that will lead you to trouble, there can be sensitive information in your online storage, such as bank account information or important business documents.

Although some providers have a strict data privacy policy, it is highly recommended that you read the Terms of Service very carefully when you are comparing  internet backup providers.

Data integrity

With the massive marketing campaigns of many online backup providers, people are often not aware that there are actually many horror stories related to online backup. There are customers whose online backups are corrupted, or just disappear without any explanation from their providers.

When you choose a provider, you should look for one that has redundant storage servers that will mirror your data in multiple locations. In this way, if the server where you store your files experiences hardware failure, your files are still available in other servers.

Your call

What backup service do you use and how efficient is it in backing up your things online? We at WinAppleWorld use Google Drive and DropBox to back up our Blog’s database and keep it secure. Write in your views in the comments below so other people can also benefit from it.