HOW TO ESTABLISH A FAIL-SAFE FOR DATA SECURITY

Emergencies do not discriminate; they target everyone – businessmen, entrepreneurs, and businesses big or small. Whether it’s Covid-19, hurricanes, floods, or tornados, you never know when a crisis scenario will hit.

The one thing that everyone has in common when a crisis hits is that they had no idea it was coming. If you asked them what they would have done differently, they would tell you, “I wish I were more prepared.” What seems like a problem you have handled can quickly spiral out of control, possibly resulting in significant losses for your company.

Not only that, a contractor or one of your employees could accidentally delete something which you spent months or years working on – poof! Gone. If it were up to you, surely you would do everything yourself, as this would give you the best control and security. But sometimes you need to hire people and trust that they will not make reckless mistakes.

Currently, with everyone working from home, sensitive company data is now spread out to millions of home offices around the globe.

Previously, you had more control as everyone was working from one centralized office, but now there is much more uncertainty.

That is a lot of unnecessary risk for you and your business. Ideally, you want to plan ahead, but in some cases, these situations require an immediate ad-hoc response.

What if any of those home computers become damaged or if there is a data breach in the RAID trays in the company's basement? This is why every business, big or small, needs to establish a fail-safe for data loss.

What is a fail-safe? It is, “A system or plan that comes into operation in the event of something going wrong or that is there to prevent such an occurrence”, according to Sunil Kumar owner of blogging hub.

But why is a fail-safe necessary when you are already backing up your data? Well, traditional backup methods on your computer use a database management system (DBA) that are vulnerable to data corruption or loss. 

In order to mitigate this risk, these traditional DBAs perform full and incremental backups, but this comes at the cost of doubling or tripling the existing storage.

Not only that, but it can also be a painful process due to the extended amount of time required to reload lost data, excessive business downtime during recovery, and a loss of data since the last backup.

Instead of using these outdated methods, it is best to contact a certified data recovery service specialist to provide you with the exact actions you need to take when you encounter a data loss emergency. Alternatively, businesses should develop a well-designed security protocol ahead of time, in the event of a data breach or drive damage strike.

 

That’s where SalvageData comes in.

 

Finding the right experts

 

SalvageData is an industry-leading data recovery services provider for the past 15 years. The process is simple. You send your device to one of their 40+ labs, they evaluate the device for free, provide you with a quote, and get your data back.

 

Whether it is data recovery, raid data recovery, SSD data recovery, HDD data recovery, you name it – they are known as the best when it comes to recovering your data. Types of data recovery may include mechanical failures, viruses & malware, system & data corruption, and accidental deletion.

 

Finding not only the right expertise but also one with cutting-edge specialized proprietary equipment is key. In addition to this, a rigorous R&D department with an advanced ISO 14644-1 class 5 data accreditation is the ultimate stamp of approval. 

 

What’s important is that you find leading experts in a field that have the proper certifications. An ISO – 5 Certified Clean Room for all mechanical recovery processes, an ISO – 9001 quality certified and SOC III security certified where regular SOC 2 Type III audits are conducted, ensuring the best security protocols.

 

As a bonus, if the data recovery center is ranked highly among organizations or other publications, it’s a good sign, you will receive top quality service and a higher success rate of data recovery. Lastly, if they can offer a warranty after the recovery is performed, you know you are in the right hands.

 

In summary, now is the time to take action. With 58 records of data being lost every second, in today’s fast-moving IT world, it’s more important than ever to find a data recovery partner to help you form a disaster recovery plan.

The consequences of not doing so could mean lost revenue, more expenses, lower customer retention rates, an overloaded IT manager, and a chain reaction of events that might take years to recover from.

How do you lose data?

Losing data is a serious issue that is faced everywhere. Many people are facing data loss from their HDDs, SSDs, and other storage devices every day. Data backup and recovery were a viable option, but it still doesn't guarantee that you will get your data restored to you in case your storage device gets wiped clean.

Generally speaking, people are more vigilant about their computers than with their external hard drives, which may also lead to their reasonably high failure levels.

Hard drives and solid-state drives can quickly get formatted due to a virus by downloading malware from the internet or even through physical damage. If you have your data backed up in a compressed file or have a cloud backup (most do not), you are fortunate.

Judging on how important our data is, would you want to risk your life's work on luck? Certainly not! Having a fail-safe solution for your storage device's information is the best way to ensure that your data remains intact even after an attack from a virus.

External hard drives are susceptible to a wide range of issues, like physical and logical malfunction, and malware, same as internal hard drives.

It's necessary to note at the end of the day that portable hard drives are just functional tools that don't last forever, no matter how high-quality the brand is or how much you care for them.

Tips to avoid data loss

External hard drives can crash, so how can you take preventive measures and secure your data in the event of a failure? Here are five tips from SalvageData’s certified experts:

1. Practice hard drive maintenance

This might seem simple, but it's an error so many people make.

To prolong your external hard drive's lifespan, and secure the data that you have saved on it, treat your drive with some care.

Get a cover for it, hold it free from condensation, moisture, high or low temperatures, and ensure it does not operate in a bumpy environment, where friction may easily affect the internal components.

If your drive suffered physical harm of some sort, send it to the nearest device repair specialist to fix it.

2. Monitor the health of your drive

External hard drives generally don't just fail without first showing some specific symptoms.

As such, it is tracking the driver's safety may be a smart means of detecting issues and avoiding failure. There are hundreds of hard drive control devices in operation that are intended to track external drive safety and diagnose errors, so you can repair them until they cause a total malfunction.

3. Don't overwhelm the drive

Do you remember the phrase "don’t put all your eggs in one basket"? With portable hard disks, that's as valid as it is with everything else.

If you overcrowd the hard drive, not only do you shorten its lifetime by operating harder and increasing wear and tear, but you can also place yourself at a higher risk of total data failure if the drive bites the dust.

Hold your hard drive under capacity, with that in mind. Purchase an extra external hard disk or use a cloud-based service to back up the device if you need to.

 

4. Always Remove the Device Safely

Instead of only taking out your storage drive when you're finished with it, select the "Remove Device" option. There are two explanations for this: The first is that disabling the computer would reduce the risk of interrupting and corrupting the data transmission.

The second is that removing the device safely would keep the drive from experiencing the surge of power usually correlated with unsafe unplugging.

5. Fail-safe your drive

Getting to the matter at hand, fail-safe your drive so that there is no risk of losing data or getting your hard drive attacked by a virus. Smart people know that creating encryption or fail-safe is the first thing that needs to be done when handling sensitive data because the majority of the tasks nowadays we perform are digital.

A lot of valuable data is stored locally. Therefore, to keep the data safe from intruders, you must make sure that your drive is encrypted or made fail-safe. SalvageData also provides premium data recovery software.

 

Fortunately, data recovery specialists are generally on stand-by both day and night to respond to your data recovery needs. Even during the COVID-19 pandemic, these recovery labs are fully operational. Include their 24/7 emergency number in your failsafe protocol for possible data recovery disasters.