Is Cloud Storage Data Loss Possible? According to Microsoft, Yes It Is.
Source: https://weareproactive.com/ Published: May 24, 2019
What You Need to Know about Cloud Storage Data Loss
Your cloud services company can decide to discontinue an offering. As this example demonstrates, the decision to back up your data is completely dependent on your software provider’s decisions.
Should they decide to retire a service or discontinue support, your data may or may not receive the security it needs.
Your cloud services company might experience a crash. It can happen. You can experience cloud storage data loss because your provider simply let you down.
Don’t make assumptions especially for legacy solutions or free services.
You can’t assume that your software provider stands behind the data you’ve placed in its cloud. It only takes one policy change to make cloud storage data loss a possibility. As the years go by, providers have a decreased incentive to support older software. That’s why you need to research the organization’s official stance on cloud back up.
You’ll also want to avoid assumptions regarding free services. A free service can limit your ability to recover data. For example, if you use the free version of Dropbox, you can’t recover files. However, this functionality is available if you pay for Dropbox. All that to say, make sure you do your homework.
Communicate with your software provider.
When in doubt, don’t hesitate to pick up the phone and make a call to your software provider. (Or, if you’re not a phone person, try sending an email or starting a live chat.) And before you reach out, think through the questions you’d like to ask. Here are some suggestions to get you started:
- “Is my data backed up?” Don’t worry about sounding ignorant. This question is too important, and you need a clear-cut answer.
- “How far is the data backed up?” You’ll want to know how far into the past your cloud storage reaches.
- “Is there a time limit on retrieval?” For example, if you accidentally delete data, will you be able to retrieve it one month later? What if you wait six months?
- “If my data gets encrypted by a virus, can we get our data back?” This is an important question because most cloud providers allow you to store a local copy of files on a business computer. However, ransomware can encrypt these files—which then get synced to the cloud, thus encrypting all your cloud data. If a situation like this occurs, you need to know that you can recover your pre-encrypted files. You also need to ask how long this will take.
Don’t place all your eggs in one basket.
If the loss of certain files can shut down your operations, I wouldn’t rely on Microsoft, Google, or any other provider by itself to secure your data. Instead, diversify your data backups. Companies are fallible. And the threat of cloud storage data loss isn’t trivial. In a case like this, no single company should have your complete confidence.
If you’ve lost important files, call Stacy (941) 246-1048; she can help.
