Backing up data is vitally important

We have seen a huge increase in cyber crime over the last few years to the extent that it has recently overtaken physical crime. Cyber attacks are extremely harmful and the costs to rectify the damage can be very expensive.

Backing up your data is an important part of the cyber risk management process and a good back-up regime will determine how quickly you can restore your systems in the event of an attack.  

Cyber insurance is a cost-effective way to meet the financial losses associated with cyber risks and provide your business with immediate incident response services to help reduce the damage.

Think about how much you rely on business-critical data such as customer information, quotes, orders and payment details. Then, think about the impact on your business if you were unable to access any of this data.

All businesses should regularly back up their important data. By doing so you can ensure your business can still function following an accident such as a fire, flood, damage or theft. Also, if you have regular backups that can be quickly recovered you are not as susceptible to ransomware attacks.

Below we outline the key considerations to make when backing up your data:

Identify what data needs to be backed up

Identify what constitutes ‘essential data’ for you and your business – which is any data that is critical for your business to function as normal. This typically includes documents, emails, contact details and calendar information.

Keep your back-up separate from your computer

You could opt for an external hard drive, a cloud storage solution, a USB stick or a separate computer. The key is to restrict access to data back-ups so that they are:

• Not accessible by staff
• Are not permanently connected (physically or over a local network) to the computer or device that stores the original copy of the file
• Ransomware and other malware can often move automatically to any storage device that is attached to the infected device, which means that any back-up would also be compromised. For even more resilience, you should ideally store your back-ups in a different location so that fire or theft won’t result in you losing both copies of the data.

Consider using the cloud

Cloud storage – where a third-party service provider stores your data on their servers – means your data is physically separate from your location. Service providers can supply your business or organisation with data storage and web services without the need to invest in any additional hardware upfront, with most offering a limited amount of storage space for free.

Make backing up part of your everyday business operations

Although backing up your data isn’t the most interesting thing to do, the key is to do it regularly so that you don’t lose any recent important data. If you only back up once a month, for instance, then you run the risk of losing up to a month’s worth of data if something should happen.

To learn more about cyber insurance in more detail, get in touch with Andy Hall on 0116 2819152 or email ahall@bhibinsurance.co.uk 

Any views or opinions expressed in this briefing are for guidance only and are not intended as a substitute for appropriate professional guidance. We have taken all reasonable steps to ensure the information contained herein is accurate at the time of writing. In relation to any particular insurance related issues, readers are advised to seek specific advice.

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