Cloud Backup Services – Bandwidth Considerations

Cloud backup systems can offer the ultimate in security for your precious data.  Depending upon the volume and frequency of your backups, it may be important to ensure that you have an adequate communications bandwidth in place to support this approach. 

We are sometimes asked to explain the variations in cloud backup services and why they affect something called ‘bandwidth’.

This is something best explained in a conversation but here is a quick overview!

All of the critical data and systems in your IT environment should be backed up.  That’s to ensure that in the event of one form of disaster or another, your critical data could be rapidly restored to enable your business to keep running.

Through our cloud backup services, all of this can be done automatically and invisibly to you.  Your data will be backed up and stored in a secure location and you will never have to worry about things such as disk copies and so on!

However, not all IT installations are the same. 

For example, some organisations have largely entirely outsourced their IT operations meaning that they don’t have big boxes sitting around on their premises.  All of their databases, applications software and so on, are stored in the Cloud already. 

That means that when their systems are being backed up, it is effectively cloud-to-cloud and nothing of their data being backed up needs to go through the communication lines between their office and the outside world.

Customers that have their file servers and software in-house can still use cloud backup services to protect them but when the data is being copied, it will be moving from the customer’s site down through one form of wire or another to a secure cloud location.

In the case of larger organisations, this can mean very substantial volumes of data are going up and down your communication lines to the outside world on a regular basis.  Depending upon the amount of space and speed that your line provider offers you (also known as its bandwidth) that might, at times, be something of an issue.

Let’s not speculate further here though. Instead, why not call us for a discussion about your specific situation and we can offer you very precise advice on cloud backups and whether or not they may be an issue for your communications infrastructure.

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New Computer Hackers Crackdown - Server Sentry

A major crackdown in the United Kingdom on computer hackers has provided a timely reminder that you can never pay too much attention to this subject and the importance of protecting yourself from such criminals.

We have recently gone through a relatively quiet period in terms of major computer security and virus news.

However, that doesn’t mean that the hackers and cyber criminals have ‘gone away’.  It simply means that the media have chosen to highlight other things over the very recent past.

Just one recent story to illustrate the need to be constantly alert though, comes this time from the United Kingdom where police have arrested 56 suspected hackers in a number of raids and operations.

Here at Server Sentry, we’d like to stress to all of our Australian clients that this sort of problem is not restricted only to the United Kingdom and other countries.  In terms of IT services, Melbourne and elsewhere in Australia are just as vulnerable to these criminals as anywhere else on the planet.

Original Source - http://www.serversentry.com.au/new-computer-hackers-crackdown/ 

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Using the Cloud or ‘Going Local’ – the Pros and Cons

There is nothing new about the debate relating to how much of your IT application architecture and data should be stored on your local PCs versus a big central location ‘somewhere else’.

That debate had its origins in the early 1980s and continues today, although we tend to talk about ‘The Cloud’ as that big central location as opposed to ‘the mainframe computer’ in times past.

So, what are the pros and cons of putting your applications on a platform that is actually not physically on your premises?

Pros

1. You won’t have to worry about things such as backups, upgrading your systems to cope with growing volumes, disaster recovery and so on. Your provider should do all that for you.


2. You may see significant cost advantages arising as a result of the reduced amount of IT equipment you might need to maintain on your own premises.


3. Your business equipment insurance issues may be simplified.


4. You will benefit from expert technical support (e.g. IT consulting) from your cloud backup services provider rather than needing to try and develop some of those skills within your own company.

Cons

1. To some extent, you may be reliant upon a third party for the provision of an environment that allows you to continue your day to day business.

2. You may have some understandable concerns relating to data confidentiality and access control –including legislative constraints. That last point may be a particular issue if you are considering using an offshore provider.

3. In some situations there might be a risk of escalating costs in future, though that can be mitigated with appropriate contract provisions.

Deciding upon the shape and location of your IT infrastructure is something that isn’t easy and that is why we at Server Sentry recommend that you allow us to assist with your analysis and decision-making processes. It just might help you to ensure you make the right decision.

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