It’s common knowledge that we should all be backing up our data. It’s important not only in case of system errors, but also in the event of stolen data and other security breaches. But what isn’t talked about as often is testing these backups.
This is something that Arizona Beverages found out the hard way. Earlier this year, the company found themselves victim to a ransomware attack that wiped information on more than 200 servers and networked computers. But the real trouble began when IT staff realized that their backup systems where misconfigured, effectively making it impossible to recover their data without outside help. Because of the mistake, the company spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on new hardware, software, and recovery services.
While there is nothing good about suffering a ransomware attack, having backups of your data can severely limit the consequences of the attack — as long those backups actually work. This is why it’s essential to regularly test your backup systems.
In order to ensure their systems are backed up frequently, organizations will often automate this process. And while this can be useful, it’s important to not just assume that everything is working as expected.
And there is more to backing up your data then the actual backup process. You want to make sure that not only that you properly backed–up targeted data, but that it can be successfully restored. This includes ensuring that no file corruption occurs in the process of backing up and restoring that data. There’s no worse feeling than restoring your data only to find it completely useless.
How frequently you test your backups should be decided by each organization depending on regulatory constraints, risk-assessment, and business strategy. However, whatever is decided should be incorporated into your cybersecurity policy and carried out consistently.
Nothing keeps IT professionals up at night like the thought of irredeemably losing system data. Not only could months or years’ worth of work vanish in an instant, but it could end up costing tons in regulatory fines and recovery services.
Simply put: test your backups, sleep easy.
