Do you really know the cost of losing your data?

Take a moment and consider if you can honestly attest that in the event of a cyber security breach or physical device failure that your business can recover every file, application and server. Are you REALLY sure?

We have all in our careers experienced minor data losses I am sure, usually caused with the accidental deletion / shredding of a small but vital piece of information. Whilst a troublesome hiccup to the business, the issue is usually handled and resolved within a matter of hours with little or no cost to the business itself.

What we are discussing here is a ‘catastrophic’ system or data loss, an event that takes days / weeks / months to recover from with potentially devastating financial consequences to the business. It is all too easy to assume that others are ‘dealing’ with the issue of security, maintenance and backups only to discover when it is too late that perhaps that trust was misguided.

In the last few months (of 2020), PacSol have helped multiple customers to recover their application and data, all caused by different ‘disaster’ scenarios. What follows are a couple of key points for you to consider against your business platform and we recommend if you cannot answer for sure, please follow up with the relevant administrator / managers in your business before it is too late.

• Is the data on your platform regularly backed up and (preferably) a copy secured offsite?
  • Database
  • Secure data area (NAS / SAN / Share)
  • Configuration
• Do you have a recovery plan for your application?
  • Stored in a location accessible even in a worst case scenario?
  • Key third party vendor contacts recently updated in documentation?
  • Recently tested to ensure ‘fit for purpose’ and signed off by the platform owner?
• Have all reasonable precautions been taken to safeguard the platform?
  • Access to the platform and assigned rights regularly reviewed and revoked as required?
  • All users correctly trained in platform usage?
  • All users regularly trained / knowledge refreshed with regard to modern cyber security threats?

Remember – the platform is only as secure as the weakest link! Unfortunately that weak point is commonly a user, due to a lack of knowledge, unwittingly making a mistake.

We have prepared some brief, basic backup guides for the platforms we support on our FAQ page. These are minimum requirements that ensure a fundamental level of data security. If you wish to discuss the issue of data retention, security and recovery, please get in touch with our support team who will be happy to go over in more detail.

Toby Gilbertson. Customer Services Manager. January 2021