The Positive Impact of Cloud Backup on Sustainable Business Practices

Sustainability has gone from a trendy buzz word to nonnegotiable business strategy as the effects of climate change start to mount.

With businesses finding new ways to work sustainably, the amount of data that every enterprise produces and stores must be reduced for the sake of the planet’s future.

Secure cloud storage has an important role to play in sustainability, because it allows organisations to free up storage space, and streamline the use of servers across the global IT industry. Here are some ways that cloud storage can contribute to efficiency and sustainability in any business.

Counting the climate cost of surplus data

The huge number of files that we all generate instantaneously can easily distract us from the fact that information is not only a virtual entity. Files also exist in physical space – be it on a storage medium or in the cloud.

Data requires electricity in order to be stored, and as our data requirements soar our energy bills are following suit.

Current estimates indicate that 1% of all electricity is used to process data. This figure is only likely to grow in the era of cryptocurrency trading and the widespread adoption of AI which uses a huge amount of data.

As we experience ongoing electricity supply problems related to Eskom, it’s easy to imagine how our global electricity supply would be constrained if unnecessary data continues to be produced and stored at the current rate.

Secure cloud storage is an effective way to free up extra storage and ensure that essential files are kept safe. At Soteria we use energy efficient data centers, eliminating the need for our clients to invest in less energy efficient computers and small servers.

Traditional storage methods represent major climate risks

With billions of internet users around the world, businesses and private individuals in almost every country have become consumers of computers, electronics and storage devices.

This is placing huge pressure on natural resources and is creating a pollution problem as recycling efforts fail to keep up with the mountain of hard drives, flash drives and other physical storage that are piling up in dumps around the world. To make matters worse , some of these discarded devices – like old routers – can pose a major security risk if they fall into the wrong hands.

Cloud storage can help to eliminate this wasteful and environmentally polluting practice by ensuring that fewer small storage devices need to be produced on an annual basis.

Localisation favours regions with sustainable energy

As businesses become more discerning about the electricity usage practices of their suppliers and choose partners who value sustainability, sustainable cloud backup services located in areas known for sustainable energy will enjoy the upper hand.

This should put some friendly pressure on data centres and other tech providers to invest in solar technology and other sustainable forms of energy generation at their facilities.

Final thoughts

Overall, secure cloud storage has the potential to support the push towards sustainability that has become so popular in the business world and is crucial for the planet’s future.

If you’d like to move away from traditional hardware and embrace a planet-friendly, economical, and safe backup storage solution, browse our range of packages for sustainable cloud businesses of all sizes today.

The 7 Types Of Data Security That Matter

With the huge wave of cyberattacks sweeping South Africa today, there’s hardly a single business owner who doesn’t recognise the importance of data security. But knowing that something is necessary and knowing how to implement it are two different things.

In this article, we cut through the sea of information on cybercrime and identify the 7 types of data security that will have the biggest impact on your company’s online safety.

Here are the factors that make the biggest difference and how you can make sure you are covered on each one.

Access Control

Going to sleep with the front door open is an invitation to criminals, and yet that’s exactly what many businesses do every day by failing to secure access to their data.

Strong passwords, firewalls, anti-malware, software, and secure cloud storage are all measures you can take to ensure that only authorised users have access to your company’s information.

Authentication

Once the front door of your company’s data is locked, you need to verify the identity of anyone who knocks on it and wants to come in.

User authentication, preferably using multiple factors to avoid impersonation crimes, is a crucial step to take in order to protect your data from online intruders.

Disaster Recovery and Backups

No matter what steps you take to protect your data, the sheer number of cyberattacks affecting South African businesses today proves yet again that cybercrime can and will happen.

If the worst case scenario comes to pass and your company becomes the victim of a cyberattack, the best response you can mount is to close off access to your data and have a clean copy of all your files for easy restoration.

Encrypted backup and secure cloud storage are the gold standard when it comes to the strategy and our range of packages for businesses of all sizes are the ideal way to get started.

Data Resiliency

Should a cyberattack occur, you need to know that you have access to your data no matter what. There are many strategies you can use to achieve this, but one of the more popular ones is the 321 method.

You should have three copies of every file: two on separate media, and the final one in the cloud.

An encrypted backup solution that syncs with your cloud-based apps and devices is the ideal way to track multiple versions of this data and ensure that they’re all updated.

Data Masking

When you share information with people outside your organisation, it’s essential to mask your data so that it can’t be used by cybercriminals.

This includes stamping any digital versions of your company documents and logos with a ”sample” watermark and never using your real data when making presentations at conferences or posting online.

Even innocent-seeming company information can be used by cybercriminals to find out crucial information about your business and plan an attack.

Data Erasure

When you stop using any device, even a wi-fi router, the first thing to do is wipe the bar drive and other storage so that your files are permanently removed – but there’s a better way to do this than normal formatting.

Data erasure removes files and rearranges the code that was used to store them so that no trace of the original file can be found and used by cybercriminals to piece together your data.

Encryption

When it comes to storage, you’ll want to ensure that all your files are encrypted, so that only you and authorised members of your company can access them.

Our range of secure cloud storage solutions feature encrypted data management and immutable coding for added security.

Keeping your data safe is far easier when you know what factors to consider. By covering the bases above, you’ll be in a stronger position to avoid and respond quickly to potential cyberattacks.