Cloud computing services are an integral part of many businesses and they handle communication, collaboration, and file storage. Because of the convenience cloud computing provides, many companies worldwide resort to Software as Service (SaaS) to manage their daily operations. Also known as on-demand software, it’s hosted centrally in the cloud in which business applications are delivered. Since SaaS offers plenty of advantages, such as lower costs, easy setup, and a high level of accessibility and scalability, SaaS deployments in business management are on the rise. Microsoft 365 has over 120 million users and saw 41% revenue growth in the company’s most recent quarterly earnings report.
Don’t put all your eggs in one basket
While many embrace the advantages that come along with SaaS, the exposure to potential risks cannot be overlooked. It may lead to dire consequences when you rely solely on cloud storage and services for your business assets. A report published earlier this year on ARN warned that unexpected downtime of either Microsoft, Google or AWS could result in a $19 billion loss for the businesses involved. Outages in the UK and the US are two recent events that put users in a difficult situation when data is only located in cloud locations.
Putting unexpected service outages or downtime aside, accidental or malicious deletion is another possibility that can result in devastating losses for businesses. According to a report from Aberdeen Group, the most common reason for data loss on SaaS is inadvertent end user deletion, even when it requires multiple confirmation steps. Although such unpredictable incidents do not happen frequently, they come at a price that can be unaffordable and even incalculable to businesses when they happen. Therefore, there’s no such thing as a fail-safe plan when it comes to storing your data simply on cloud storage, especially those containing sensitive or confidential information.
Taking responsibility for your cloud data
To protect against data loss, it is essential to take safety precautions to ensure your data is secure. Now that we understand the potential risks of data storage on SaaS platforms, it is time to consider making your data safe and sound with an extra layer of protection. One of the countermeasures against data loss is to back up your cloud data.
Therefore, many backup solutions were developed in the market in response to the need to keep data safe in the event of unexpected incidents. However, no matter how you approach it, managing backups of different SaaS solutions on different platforms is going to come at the cost, of either time or effort, to businesses. It might initially seem counterintuitive, but an on-premises solution that integrates SaaS backup on a single platform is a helpful way to ensure the effectiveness and efficiency of data backup practices.
When choosing a backup package, you should take the following into consideration. First and foremost, you have to see if it supports various SaaS platforms, particularly the most popular SaaS platforms– Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace, so that businesses can easily create and manage backup tasks from Microsoft OneDrive and My Drives or Team Drives on Google. Second, if there are different backup modes available, such as continuous backup, manual backup, and scheduled backup. With various modes at your disposal, you can choose whichever works best for you based on your needs. Finally, it is also of great importance for a backup package to include block-level deduplication and single instancing technologies so that businesses can make the most of their storage space.
Backing up your SaaS data is not only what you should do but what you must do. New technologies come with new risks but there’s no excuse for being unprepared. Get yourself prepared so when a disaster strikes, you can ride out the storm unscathed.
Synology Active Backup for Microsoft 365 and Active Backup for G Suite are now available, offering comprehensive backup service extensions for mailbox, calendar, and contacts.
To learn more about the features of the Active Backup suite, please visit