Remote Working | Backing up your data while working from home

Remote working | Written by Quadra IT Manager – Steve Taylor

With many people currently remote working from home during the pandemic, many companies are using a VPN to access data stored on company servers and computers etc. But in today’s blog, Quadra’s IT Manager, Steve Taylor, suggests how not backing up your data could really get your “back-up.”

Back it up, Back it up and let me begin!

Backing up your data is always important.

However, during this Pandemic, this process may be overlooked if there is no-one left in your office to change backup devices or if data is being created locally on home computers. Remote working has it’s challenges.

If you haven’t done so already, I recommend discussing backups with your IT department or external IT company. They may be able to assure you that backups will continue to take place in the absence of onsite staff or alternative backup procedures may need to be set up. Either way, it gives you confidence that data can be restored from backup media should it be necessary.

Managing your own Back-ups?

For those without the luxury of a dedicated or outsourced IT team, then you or someone in your company needs to ensure backups continue to happen whilst everyone is working from home. Data stored locally on home computers can be copied to external USB hard drives. Some USB drives are self-encrypting and are ideal for sensitive data. An alternative is cloud storage – examples include Dropbox, Google Drive and Microsoft One-drive.

If you’re unsure whether you need to invest in backup procedures, think of how much your data is worth in terms of money. It may be only a few gigabytes in size but if you lose this data and have no backup, recreating it from scratch could be expensive.

I have rebuilt systems that have failed for various reasons but this would have been impossible without data backups. The companies in question were back to normal in a relatively short period of time. I dread to think what would have happened if their data hadn’t been recoverable. Please stay safe and remember…..

Backup, backup, backup

Contact our support for any queries about backing up your software

Quadra are also able to help you with hardware related queries – contact us for more information