Safeguarding your data: why businesses are backing up the cloud

Five key benefits of using a cloud backup and archiving solution.

Unsurprisingly, we’ve seen cloud adoption accelerate significantly over the past six months, with businesses relying heavily on providers such as Microsoft, Amazon and Google to operate. Undeniably, productivity solutions such as Microsoft 365 bring game-changing efficiencies, as well as support flexible working. However, in the race to adoption, pause to consider your company’s lifeblood. Data.

Not so long ago…

Many IT professionals will remember life before the cloud. When a company had an IT need, it would be translated into an infrastructure requirement. Once designed, implemented and brought into service, there were two key areas to focus on: availability and backup.

Of course, service availability (“keeping the lights on”) is a now major driver for companies looking to move towards cloud services. Offloading this responsibility allows businesses to focus on consuming the service without the burden of supporting it.

So, what about backup?

This is one of the key areas we discuss with customers when devising their cloud strategy. It’s a serious common misconception to assume that all cloud service providers automatically back up your corporate data as comprehensively as when it was managed traditionally on site.

While many SaaS providers take on the responsibility of application uptime and the underlying infrastructure, chances are it will be down to the customer to manage and protect their own vital business data. After all, no SaaS provider can be expected to appreciate the value of a company’s data as well as the company that owns it.

What about Microsoft 365?

Microsoft 365 is a good example of the above. Many companies make the leap to Microsoft 365 to enjoy the productivity feature set, as well as the benefits of SaaS, without necessarily considering what the native data backup included with the platform does. It’s important to remember that Microsoft’s focus is on availability — and much less on comprehensive data restoration.

Why use a cloud backup solution?

Easy management
Standard inbuilt backup policies can be difficult to keep up with and maintain while a dedicated backup solution provides longer, more easily accessible retention of key business data.

More frequent backups
Dedicated solutions allow for backups to be taken on a regular basis, therefore reducing the RPO (Recovery Point Objective).

Cyber attack recovery
Ransomware and external security threats are ever present. Having comprehensive point-in-time backups allows you to easily restore affected items to a specific moment before infection.

Protection from human error
Accidental deletion accounts for a large proportion of data loss and these scenarios usually require prompt action. A backup solution with known retention and recovery capabilities will reduce business stress when such mistakes occur.

Peace of mind
A SaaS provider’s tools should not be your only protection to ensure your business has complete records in the event of data loss. Comprehensive data backup and archiving is a logical insurance policy against this risk.

Reasons to adopt cloud technologies are too compelling to dismiss. However, while planning your journey, understand whether your data protection policies will change because you will be using a cloud service. If you’re not happy with the vendor’s built-in protection, consider a cloud backup solution to give you total peace of mind.

Our team of specialists work to understand your IT needs and provide you with the best backup solutions to safeguard your data. To discuss your cloud strategy and backup requirements, call our expert team on 03330 11 22 55.