James Barnett, Senior IT Engineer and Cloud Back-up Expert at Active8 IT answers common questions relating to Data Back-up.
We are currently using tapes to back up all of our data on a daily basis. Is this ok? I am concerned that things may be lost.
This is one of the most common
issues documented and an important question. It is essential to regularly
perform test restores and validate what is actually backed-up. With tape
backups this is quite often overlooked, due to the nature of the media it can
be time consuming especially as tapes may need to be couriered back to site.
Another issue is that many
companies that use tapes and don’t actually take them offsite, which can lead
potentially full data loss if the premises were to have a fire etc.
We are thinking of using a Cloud Back Up service provider.
How and when is the Data backed up?
Software is installed on an
existing on-site server or a dedicated backup server. The required servers and
data can then be selected for backup. The backup server simply needs relevant
user credentials and network access to the data required.
The backups can be configured to
run as and when is appropriate to meet your requirements and there is also the
capability to manage the bandwidth usage for offsiting of data. Another
advantage of the software is automatic updating which is centrally controlled
by your service provider so no user input is required.
What if I need to retrieve my data, how quickly can this
happen?
There are 3 methods of retrieval
Local storage retrieval: this is
most commonly just the latest generation of a file and is held on the your site
for very rapid LAN or DAS speed recovery.
Offsite internet retrieval: any
data to be restored that is not local can be retrieved over the internet and
the speed here is almost virtually dependent upon internet connection due to
the very high speed links in the data centre.
Offsite couriered retrieval: If
a very large restore is required you can also request a “DisktoTape” which
means required data would be extracted using an automated system and encrypted
data can be shipped for local retrieval.
We have a large amount of Financial Data, can this be
compressed? How safe will it be?
Ensure that you use a provider that hosts your data in this
country using their own equipment so no third parties have access to data and
cannot get hold of data. The backups should be encrypted
ranging from DES 56bit up to AES-256.
The majority of data can be
compressed with some formats reaching an 8:1 ratio and due to the incremental
forever methodology the effective compression becomes more noticeable over time
as only delta changes are sent.
If you have any specific questions regarding this, we are happy to help. Contact info@active8it.co.uk
