Losing data can be a traumatic experience, especially if your files are important to you, such as invoices for businesses or personal images and videos you intend to keep. Whether you store data as a business or for personal use, you should always remember to have a backup copy on an external hard drive or cloud based service.
Backing up data shouldn’t just be limited to your computer, so also think about portable devices such as tablets and mobile phones.
Reasons to back up your data
- Your operating system might fail and could corrupt your hard drive’s data.
- Your hard drive might fail.
- A virus may corrupt some or all of your data.
- Accidental deletion.
- A fire or water damage.
- Theft
How often should you back up your data?
This really depends on how valuable your data is to you, but as a rule of thumb, backup as often as your data changes.
What else is there to consider when backing up?
You should test some of the data you’ve backed up, just in case it hasn’t been copied over properly, and if you’ve copied to an external drive, you may want to store it elsewhere other than next to your computer in case of theft or damage.
Would you like any advice on how to back up your data and what might work best for you? Check out a list of free and paid for backup and storage solutions. Alternatively, please feel free to get in touch.