In this day and age Companies are incredibly reliant on their business-critical data. Consider how much information relating to orders, invoices and accounting is stored electronically. The potential repercussions of losing this data without a reliable way of restoring this could be devastating.

A suitable and robust data backup policy is intrinsically linked with the opportunity for a company to function as normal, or as close to normal, following a disaster. The results of various online surveys suggest there are still an alarming number of UK companies that do not have a suitable data backup policy in place.

There are numerous ways in which business-critical data could be lost. Some of the most obvious examples include flooding, fire damage or theft. With this in mind, it is clear that a suitable data backup policy should include measures for backing up data at a separate location. Having data backups stored in the same location will be of no use if all backups are damaged or lost following a flood or fire.

These are not the only ways in which data can be lost and it is also important to take cyber security into account. No company or institution is immune from ransomware attacks which is demonstrated by such an attack on the NHS in recent years. It would be very costly to restore such data if there are no recent backups in place.

In addition to backing up information on an external drive, there are also cloud solutions available. By definition, backing up information using a cloud-based solution would ensure business-critical information is stored securely at a separate location which, in turn, reduces the risk of data loss following a natural disaster, or similar, at your main place of business.

Regularly backing up data may at first appear to be an administrative burden but the benefits of mitigating the financial risk of data loss should not be taken for granted. An effective data recovery plan is an essential part of safeguarding the future of all companies.