What is Your Data Worth?                   

Chip Meyer

CEO, The Chip, Inc., a Microsoft Gold Partner focused on technology solutions for small business

It starts with that panicked phone call, “my hard drive crashed,” or “my computer was stolen,” or even “I accidentally backed my car over my laptop,” followed by the inevitable, “I can’t afford to lose my data!”  With a little planning, your data is safe and your day is not ruined.   If the computer is stolen, there is no check that can be written to recover the data, so you had better have a good backup.  If the hard drive is simply damaged, then it is possible to recover the data, but the cost can be far more expensive than most people realize.

Professional data recovery costs thousands, even tens of thousands of dollars.  You’d be surprised at what can be recovered: after the Columbia Space Shuttle disaster, a company called Ontrack was able to recover data from a drive that had been found in the scattered wreckage.  That data recovery was unavoidable, and NASA could afford it.  For a small business, a good backup strategy is a bargain that makes data recovery costs an avoidable expense.

Most businesses will need a multi-tiered approach to their backups.  Your road warriors should have an online solution from someone like Carbonite, Iron Mountain, or Webroot.  Such solutions keep a copy of your key data files on their servers, so even if you lose your laptop while on the road you can still get at your data in time to make that presentation.  I use Webroot on my laptop because it has integrated virus protection along with the backups, plus it only costs me about $30 a year.

On a network, your desktop computers can be backed up to your server, or use the server as the primary storage point for all data.  This concentrates your data for easier backups and management.  For the actual servers, I generally recommend some combination of disk or tape-based systems for daily backups and monthly archival, depending on the nature of your business and your data. 

Remember that a backup is only as good as your ability to restore, so you need to assure your backups are test-restored and verified.  This is a major reason behind a multi-tiered backup strategy.  In that way, if your primary backup has trouble restoring some or all of your files, you have a secondary backup available from a different source.

One important point most people overlook when discussing backups is the anticipated down time.  Having your data is safe does not guarantee you can get at it easily, because you still need a working computer to restore your data onto.  The time required to re-load all of your software can take hours or days, even assuming you can find all your CDs and license keys. 

This is especially critical with servers and laptops, where the installed software is often unique to that system.  For this reason, I recommend making a drive snapshot, including the operating system and all your software.  If your system is lost or stolen, or the drive fails, you can restore the drive snapshot and have a replacement computer up and running exactly like your old system in minutes rather than hours.  For an important server, these drive snapshots can be kept up-to-date and off-site, allowing your business to also meet your needs for disaster preparedness and business continuity. 

None of these services are particularly expensive, at least not compared against the risk of data loss or the cost of data recovery, let alone your valuable time.