Businesses are now more aware then ever of the costs associated with data loss and need no encouragement to back it up. However, an area that is often neglected is recovery and ensuring what's backed up is recoverable.

It is fair to say that many organisations, especially those without dedicated IT staff, can assume that once the back-up is done the job is complete, but unfortunately this isn't the case. The reality is that back-up is only a third of the job. Verifying the back-up and protecting the data afterwards are as critical, if not more so, to the process. Essentially, data that is backed up, but not verified and protected is worthless.

The two main pitfalls businesses tend to fall into when it comes to recovery are not verifying the back-up and not realising the media they back-up to degrades over time. Small businesses or start-ups tend to have limited IT support and can therefore be worst affected. With no dedicated IT staff, logs that are generated by the back-up software can sometimes be overlooked and failed data back-ups missed.

Once the back up is completed and verified the tapes and equipment used to mange the process must be constantly reviewed and serviced. Unfortunately there have been many cases where businesses have lost data and gone to recover it only to find that the tapes have degraded or they longer have the required hardware to read them.

These pitfalls however, can be easily avoided through the implementation of a regimented routine and schedule. Businesses should aim to verify each back-up and change media on a regular basis, as well as checking the hardware is up to date and legacy media are recoverable.

Furthermore, businesses need to ensure that any media stored offsite is done so in an environment that is both temperature and humidity controlled to decrease this risk of degradation.

What's critical to the whole of the back-up and recovery process is having the appropriate procedures in place and as usual this comes down to the risk versus expense balancing act. Most SMEs and start-ups should aim to have at least two sets of media, rotating them weekly with one set onsite, the other offsite, and a monthly back-up that is held offsite indefinitely. This means that even in the worst-case scenario an organisation will only lose a maximum of one week's worth of data.

The final part of the back-up and recovery jigsaw is ensuring that once the data's verified and backed up it is protected. The key to protecting it is to ensure you have a number of copies available should your fire safe be damaged on location, or your offsite facility fail. In terms of storing the data offsite you have two different options; the first is to store it in a facility with both cooling and environmental controls.

The second is to store it in a co-location environment, the benefit of which is that you are able to retrieve the data almost instantly. Disk co-location storage is best used for business critical data that requires quick recovery times, whilst offsite media storage is a better option for files and documents that don't require quick access such as old employments records.

Ultimately, it doesn't matter whether you are a start-up, SME or enterprise, the procedures are the same and the costs are too. A Bed and Breakfast unable to recover its room bookings data is as badly affected as a multinational bank that is unable to recover its investment records. The key thing to remember is, just because you've backed it up doesn't mean it's safe, so remember to check, verify and protect.

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