World Backup Day took place on the 31st of March and it is a great reminder to everyone of the importance of safeguarding your data. Though it is an important task for anyone to complete, be it personal or business data, it is businesses who are the most at risk both in financial terms as well as in terms of reputation.

So to answer the question in short – Is business backup and recovery really that important?

Yes. Yes it really is.

What exactly is backup and recovery?

Backup and recovery refers to the replication and storage of data on or at a separate location so that in the event of a data loss there is a second copy available. Recovery refers to the process of reinstating that backed up data to its original location or state so that it can be used as a replacement for the original data.

Both data backup and recovery are important to ensure that business operations can continue even after a data loss has occurred.

Why is backup and recovery so important?

A crucial element for any business is to ensure business continuity. A disruption to operations due to data loss, breach or any other reason has the potential to cost a company greatly. A common mistake, however, is that many smaller businesses don’t believe that they are at any great risk of this and so do not take adequate measures to safeguard their data.

Though the big corporations of the world are indeed prime targets for cybercriminals, many hackers will prey on smaller businesses exactly for the reason above. They will assume that they do not have any substantial protections in place and will therefore go for the low hanging fruit.

In 2020, 95% of data breaches were caused by mistakes made by employees.

And it is not just hackers that pose a threat to data. Human error is a major cause of data loss or breach with 95% of data breaches last year being caused by mistakes made by employees.

The odds really are stacked against businesses nowadays in terms of cyber security and so it is absolutely crucial to have the right security measures and recovery steps in place to protect against such threats.

The scary truth

A new Hiscox report, which surveyed 355 companies in Ireland last year, showed that 41% of Irish businesses suffered at least one cyber attack in 2020. With the report also revealing that 6.5% of Irish firms paid a ransom following a ransomware attack. The total cost of all cyber incidents and breaches among the 335 Irish companies surveyed was €96million. One of the companies alone reported cyber losses totalling €17.8m with the largest single event of those amounting to €4.5m. And that is just a small proportion of the businesses currently operating in Ireland. You can be sure thousands more have experienced similar.

In a 2020 survey of 355 Irish companies, 41% of businesses suffered at least one cyber attack. 6.5% paid a ransom following a ransomware attack, and the total cost of cyber incidents and breaches among the companies surveyed was €96million.

Furthermore, since the pandemic began and more people are working from home, in many cases using unprotected networks and/or personal devices, there has been a huge increase in cyber attacks. 26% of remote workers in Ireland have reported being the victim of a cyber attack over the last year, with 57% of respondents saying that they have not received any additional cyber security training to prepare them for working from home securely.

Real cases of cyber attacks

The most recently published cyber attack to happen in Ireland occurred in February of 2021, with popular courier service providers Fastway Couriers where customer data from over 440,000 parcels was accessed by hackers. This has caused huge issues for the company from both a financial and reputational stand point.

Another unfortunate victim of cybercriminals in previous years was Meath County Council. In this case a phishing email was sent to an employee with a malicious link. Once opened and downloaded, the malware was able to steal the employees email login details and intercept emails coming in and out of the inbox. This enabled the actors to arrange the redirection of €4.3million to the bank account of the cybercriminal group.

Simple measures like training staff on cyber security awareness and implementing policies and procedures could have gone a long way to prevent such attacks. Another area of concern is that over 80% of businesses surveyed are operating with legacy anti-virus software that will be of little to no use against the sophisticated cyber attacks that are being carried out today. This lack of protection along with a weak (or in some cases non-existent) backup and recovery strategy are putting businesses at grave risk.

Conclusion

By implementing adequate security measures to protect your company data as well as having a backup and recovery plan in place should the worst happen, you can have peace of mind that you are ready to deal with any event.

Being able to retrieve, overwrite and restore a copy of lost or compromised data means your business operations will be able to continue with minimal to no disruption and your customers will be at ease knowing that you are equipped to deal swiftly with such matters.

If the idea of implementing a backup and recovery plan seems daunting, save yourself the worry and get in touch. Here at Calnet IT Solutions, we provide top quality backup solutions that are fully managed and monitored, ensuring that your data can be rapidly recovered should any issue arise.

Call our team today on +353 (0)1 8183272 or email us at info@calnet.ie for a quote.