Online backup provider Databackup.ie has signed up more than 2,500 organisations so far and is projecting €5m worth of business this year. Tom O’Connor is co-founder and managing director
Under the Data Protection Act, all businesses are expected to protect customer data. Are many opting for online backup and restore?
Larger organisations are more eager to protect data because they are aware of the risks.
With a lot of companies downsizing, and with people leaving jobs, the risks are now greater. Many are setting up new businesses in the same sector, so that’s a big risk to enterprises if former employees are walking out with crucial customer data.
Data protection and backup technology tie in easily with anti-virus and anti-spyware. Firms should assess what they are spending on protecting their data and see if they can incorporate data loss protection into that cost.
How does the online backup model work?
We sell businesses the storage space and they control and manage their data via the internet. We are the only backup provider in Europe that provides businesses with a control panel to manage their data backup.
Our ability to cross-pair with data centres means we can put in place our own firewalls, routers and IP addresses.
How secure is the online backup and restore model?
Security is a core aspect of cloud computing and few businesses realise that if they are accessing a shared cloud, they often share the same DNS gateway with other companies. If one company’s network is poisoned by a virus, any traffic on that network can be captured.
Data backup providers should have their own security infrastructure in place, rather than sharing it.
We’ve built our own cloud, which is specifically suited to backup and is affordable. What most firms pay up to €600 for in terms of security, we can do for around €100.
What is the driving force for companies opting for online backup and recovery?
There are a lot of companies that want to be compliant about data-protection legislation.
All you need is a broadband connection. Each night, your key corporate data is backed up and stored in a secure location. You can retrieve the data you need at any point.
This gives businesses that are using VMware, for example, the ability to perform an entire bare metal restore. The software takes an image of the disk and incrementally updates everything throughout the day.
It’s a fantastic investment for businesses that have their own bespoke databases and applications and are keen to safeguard the investment.
Many firms are considering the move to virtualisation, but many others still use tape to back up private data. Is this wise?
The problem with tape backup is it doesn’t provide you with a report. Also, in this era of device loss and thefts, the software is intelligent enough to classify data, so that valuable information won’t be contained on devices if you so wish it.
For example, you can classify a document so it can’t be transferred to an iPhone, or so no one can do screen grabs of pages.
By John Kennedy
