Carroll County Times Articles
What Every Business Owner Must Know About Protecting and Preserving Their Company's Critical Data
by David Hodgdon – May 8, 2008
Have you ever lost an hour of work on your computer? How frustrating! Now imagine if you lost days or weeks of work. Imagine losing your client database, financial records, and all of the files your company has ever produced from fire, flood or theft. Imagine what would happen if your network went down for days, and you couldn't access e-mail or the information. How quickly do you think you could recover, if at all? Most business owners tend to forget about taking steps to secure their company's data network from these types of catastrophes until disaster strikes. By then it's too late, the damage is done and if you're a small business, the statistics say you will be out of business...forever.
Most small and medium size businesses try to save and do their own in-house IT support by making the person who knows the most about using a computer responsible. Well, you might be a great driver but are you a good mechanic too? This inevitably results in a network that is ill-maintained, unstable and expensive to repair. If you insist on doing it yourself below are three things you absolutely must be doing. For more info, download a free comprehensive 13 page Business Owner's Guide To Protecting And Preserving Your Critical Data at www.HFITservices.com/protect.
- Make sure you backup up your files every day and test the backup. This is simple advice that's usually ignored. For most businesses, the data stored on their computers is far more valuable than any other business asset and is impossible to replace with an insurance check. Do you have a backup system? When did you last check to make sure it was working properly? Would you know if it wasn't? Do you test the backup by restoring some of the data each month? Do you even know how? Do you keep a current copy of the backup off-site?
- Make sure your anti-virus and anti-spyware protection is always on and up to date. You need protection from both threats and you need two different products to do it. No manufacturer has developed one program that does a good job doing both though there are some in development that show promise.
- Install a firewall. Small business owners tend to think that because they are "just a small business", no one would waste time trying to hack into their network, when nothing could be further from the truth. Today's firewalls are affordable and offer protection from not only hackers but viruses, spam and dangerous websites as well.
Clearly, someone needs to be paying close attention to your systems to ensure that they run smoothly and you are protected against loss. Imagine your employees never complaining about their computers. Imagine having that proposal you accidentally deleted restored in minutes. Imagine increased profitability and protection from disaster. You don't need to simply imagine because all this and more is affordable and within your reach.
About the Author
David Hodgdon is the owner of Hassle Free IT Services (www.HassleFreeITServices.com) of Westminster and a member of the Carroll Technology Council. Send email to David with any questions or comments to info@hasslefreeitservices.com or go to the Tech Council website, www.carrolltechcouncil.org, for more information.
