The Best Ways to Protect Your Business Information

File Backups

Protecting your business’s information involves securing your computers and backing up your files. The first step in securing your business’s information is backing up your files. If you have a computer crash or a catastrophe like a fire and lose all your data, you may very well lose clients and even your business. Backing up to external hard drives is one solution, but you have to remember to back up regularly and then keep the hard drives somewhere safe offsite. An external hard drive can be lost, stolen, damaged or can fail just like a computer.

A better option is using on online backup service. Your data is constantly backed up so that your backup is always current and is stored on a secure server in another location. If you lose your files to a computer crash, computer theft, virus, fire or human error, you can simply sign into your account and download all your information to a new computer. Online backup services have a yearly fee but it’s well worth the money to know that your business’s files are protected no matter what might happen to your computers.

Anitviris Software

The next step in securing your business’s information is investing in a good antivirus program. A good antivirus program is not one that you download for free from the Internet. Free programs do not have all the features of the full program and offer little more in the way of technical support than forums where you have to ask a question and hope that someone will answer you and that their answer will be correct. No matter what antivirus software you use, you can still get a virus because hackers are working around the clock to find ways to defeat the best antivirus software.

If you get a virus despite your antivirus software, you need to be able to pick up the phone and get technical support. When looking for antivirus software for your business, shop around and find one that offers free technical support by phone or by a technician remotely accessing your computer. It’s always wise to check out the computer repair options in your town in case you would rather taken an infected computer into a shop or call someone who can come into your business and clean up your computers. No matter how many times you tell your employees not to go online while at work and not to open strange email attachments, someone will do it and get a virus on their computer that can sweep through your network in short order. Remember that viruses can appear to be a work-related PDF file too, so even the boss can accidentally download a virus.

Passwords

The last step to computer security is passwords. All computers containing sensitive information should have passwords known only to the people authorized to use those computers. Laptops that are brought into work and taken home by employees should have passwords in case they are lost or stolen. The company email accounts and accounts for websites or programs such as Dropbox should be changed regularly, and immediately after the decision to terminate an employee is made.

This article was written by Lexy Mulheim on behalf of CPUInc.com who specializes in computer storage devices including tape drives and raid storage.

Featured image on home page courtesy of kunstee.