However, it doesn't do anything to prevent bit rot, file corruption, accidental deletions, ransomware or a power surge frying the RAID array.īackups store multiple versions of files so you can go back in time. RAID protects against hard drive failure. Although some cloud synchronization services have some form of versioning, retention of old versions is usually limited to a short period like 30 days.

However, this also means that any accidental deletions or files being overridden by ransomware gets propagated to all your other devices.

They are designed for keeping files on multiple devices synced. Services like Dropbox and Google Drive market themselves as a backup solution. This also has the nice side effect of efficient incremental backups because only the parts of the file that changed need to be stored.īackups are often used interchangeably with cloud synchronization services. This is done by breaking up data into smaller blocks so that if two files are mostly similar, only blocks that represent the differences between both files need to be stored.

Data deduplication: avoids storing multiple copies of the same data.This is especially important when backing up to the cloud. Encryption: encryption is the only way to ensure the confidentiality and integrity of your backups.Cloud storage support: backing up to the cloud is an easy way of having an off-site copy of data.This means that backup copies should not be mounted onto the filesystem, as that leaves them vulnerable to being encrypted as well. Ransomware-proof: ransomware is becoming increasingly common. 1 copy of the data is off-site (on the cloud or in a different physical location).Copies should be stored on at least 2 different devices.3 copies of data: a primary copy and 2 backups.Automated: backups are only effective if they happen automatically in the background.ģ-2-1 Rule: backups should follow the 3-2-1 rule.This means I needed something that would work on both Windows and Linux. Cross-platform support: I needed to back up files on my Windows laptop as well as a Synology DS918+ NAS.Step 2: Automating Client Backups to The ServerĪ good backup system should have the following:.

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