Using the Cloud to protect your data

Your business has a responsibility to protect data against accidental deletion or loss. The Data Protection Act 1998 outlines your business’ responsibilities for keeping customer and employee personal info safe for instance. Having a backup copy of your data could also mean the difference between bankruptcy and survival in the event of a local disaster that destroys your head office.

The need for data backups cannot be understated, but the Cloud also provides a convenient way to simplify this process. Services like Dropbox, Microsoft OneDrive and Google Drive all provide a way to synchronise data from your company computers to Internet-based Cloud storage. Not only does this ensure you have a copy of your data at all times, it also means that you can access that information any place, any time even allowing for greater collaboration between your employees.

Many modern accounts systems like Xero use Cloud technologies to ensure that you always have a copy of your data backed up offsite automatically. Xero actually works directly with Google to streamline the data backup processes, so that financial reports can be exported directly from the accounts system into a company Google Drive repository.

The Cloud is not recommended as your only form of data backup, but it is a useful, flexible fallback that could help keep your business running in case of emergency. For more help and advice about choosing a Cloud-compatible accounts system that protects your data, drop us a line.