Protect Against Malware

Protect Against Malware

I talked a little about backups in my last post and that primarily dealt with personal computers. Increasingly more people are using portable devices, such as tablets and phones, to store valuable information. However, many people never think about protecting these ‘mini computers’ or backing them up. It is predicted that this year there will be an explosion of malware exploits on mobile devices. So it is important to get malware/virus protection for these devices as well.

Additionally, you need to backup these devices also, ideally to your computer. Most people do not even think about backing up a cell phone. Phones are replacing portable cameras, important documents are stored , contact information, and all your apps. Phones are often dropped, stolen, or replaced and having a backup of that information can get you up and running much sooner.

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Never Ignore the Need to Backup

Never Ignore the Need to Backup

In all my years of working in technology the most problem I encounter is the lack of a backup. First and foremost a backup means you have 2 copies of the data – original and copy. There are a variety of devices, utilities, and options for backup and I won’t go into that. The first step is to choose a method and create a plan. Secondly, is that you have to test the backup. Just this week I had a customer that handed me an external hard drive and said the backup is about a month old. There was absolutely NO backup on the drive. I cannot explain why not, since the computer hard drive was dead. But he had another Cloud backup, yea.

However, it only had a fraction of the data because the initial backup to a Cloud based backup can take a long time depending on how much you have to backup, since the upstream connection is so much slower than the downstream. Compounding this issue it that most laptop users habitually shutdown or close the lid on the laptop which puts it to sleep and nothing gets backed up. We have so much more information on our computers these days. There are irreplaceable photos from our digital camera, email, financial information and music. Give me a call and I can help you find a solution that works best for you or your company and help you understand what you need to do to maintain it.

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