Let’s talk about data – your company data to be more specific, and of course your ransomware backup plan!
Your data is probably one of the most valuable assets your business will ever have; valuable to you and sadly, just as valuable to cybercriminals. The data your business collects can be used to make better business decisions, drive sales, and truly appeal to your target audience. But then there’s the reality of just how big a schlep it is to keep the stored data safe in today’s heightened risk of a ransomware attack.
your first line of defence
You can employ the most highly skilled IT specialists to work in your IT department and still a ransomware attack can bring your business to its knees.
For a business to stand a chance against the increasing number of daily ransomware attacks, it has to ensure that every staff member understands the risks and takes responsibility for their actions when using the company system, network, and devices. And we all know how hard it is to get everyone on board.
It’s also important to have the right tools to monitor systems and provide a good line of defence so that when staff members behave as trained to, the data remains completely safe; and when the business is faced by a threat, rapid reaction can be set in place.
so how does a business protect itself?
Prevention is a great option, but business owners should focus first and foremost on maintaining well-managed data systems.
A well-managed data system means data can be easily located and easily updated with the latest security features. One of the problems that many companies are faced with is how to store the data so that it can be used if there’s ever a ransomware attack that cannot be thwarted. This is where having a ransomware backup plan comes into play. What does a good ransomware backup plan look like? Read on to find out.
a good ransomware backup plan
Below are a few pointers for creating a reliable ransomware backup plan.
- Implement an actual security policy that focuses on ransomware
You cannot expect staff members to be accountable for their data management if there’s no set of rules for them to follow. Make sure that there are very clear guidelines to how data is collected, how it is tagged and saved, how often it is backed up, and how staff should behave when faced with possible threats.
- Eliminate weak links
A weak link could be anyone involved in the accessing and use of data in the business who doesn’t follow through with their responsibility to protect the data. It could be a manager who doesn’t enforce the company-wide security policies. It could be an IT professional who doesn’t train staff on their data security responsibility. It could even be the employee who simply doesn’t understand the importance of making weekly password updates, or the one who clicks on random email links having been advised not to. Regardless of how repetitive you have to get, you need to drive the message home that there are consequences to not following company security policies.
- Isolate your backups
A multi-level backup strategy is the only way to ensure that once ransomware hits your system, it doesn’t infect the entire set up. Make the isolating of backups a top priority. What does this mean? It means that you use an external cloud backup service for the storage of your data. This service is separate from your network system and is updated with the very latest security policies.
- Regularly replicate data
If you only have one copy of critical data and ransomware just happens to infect it, there’s no way you are going to get your data back without paying the ransom. Replicating your data regularly is a good way to safeguard against this. Keep one copy of the data offsite and two copies on two separate devices. If one or two of these copies are infected, you still have one more option to rely on.
- Run encrypted backups regularly
It doesn’t help if you have all the tools and systems in place, but staff forget to back up their data. It goes without saying that the data must be encrypted as that’s the most secure option, but in addition to that, backups should run regularly with minimal effort required from staff members. You can automate backups on devices to save time and to provide you with peace of mind.
Last Word
Having a ransomware backup plan is essential, regardless of the size and nature of your business. Don’t be fooled – hackers don’t only go after the world’s biggest brands. Smaller companies are becoming an easy target for the ransomware attacker looking for a quick buck. Do the work – protect your business and you stand a greater chance of avoiding data hacking/encrypting hell.