Backup
“Can we get the data back?”
Copies of your data, stored separately, that can be restored if the original is lost, corrupted or encrypted. Backup is about the data itself — not about how quickly the business resumes.
When Something Goes Wrong, Be Ready.
Your data is critical. We help make sure it is backed up, protected, monitored, tested, and recoverable when you need it.
What We Plan For
Data Loss Rarely Announces Itself
Most businesses that lose data do not lose it dramatically. They lose it on an ordinary Tuesday.
Data loss
Files overwritten, corrupted, or gone without anyone noticing for weeks.
Hardware failure
A drive, server or NAS fails — usually the one nobody had replaced yet.
Ransomware
Data encrypted and held hostage, often after weeks of quiet access.
Accidental deletion
The single most common cause, and the easiest to recover from — if backups exist.
System failure
An update, migration or configuration change that does not go to plan.
Business interruption
Power, connectivity, premises access or a supplier outage stopping work entirely.
Getting the Terms Right
Backup, Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity Are Not the Same Thing
They are often used interchangeably, and that is where planning gaps come from. Each one answers a different question.
Disaster Recovery
“How fast can systems run again?”
The plan and the technical capability to bring systems, servers and applications back into service within an agreed timeframe. Backup is an ingredient; disaster recovery is the recipe.
Business Continuity
“How does the business keep operating?”
The broader plan covering how your people keep serving clients while systems are being restored — where they work, how they communicate, and what happens manually in the meantime.
Why it mattersA business with good backups and no disaster recovery plan can eventually get its data back — but may take days to work out how, in what order, and on what hardware. Those days are the actual cost.
Our Services
Protected, Monitored, and Actually Tested
Server Backup
Protection for the servers running your business applications, line-of-business systems and shared data.
Endpoint Backup
Backup for laptops and workstations, so a lost or failed device does not take work with it.
Microsoft 365 Backup
A recovery point you control for email, OneDrive, SharePoint and Teams data — separate from the platform’s own retention.
Backup Monitoring
Backups are checked routinely. A job that silently stopped running three weeks ago is not a backup.
Recovery Testing
We test restores on a schedule, so the first real recovery attempt is not during an emergency.
Disaster Recovery Planning
A documented plan covering what gets restored, in what order, by whom, and to what target timeframe.
Business Continuity Planning
How your people keep serving clients while systems are being brought back.
Recovery Objectives
We agree how much data you can afford to lose and how long you can afford to be down, then design to those numbers.
Documentation
Your environment written down, so recovery does not depend on one person’s memory.
Straight Talk
Backups Alone Do Not Stop Ransomware
You will see backup marketed as ransomware protection. It is more accurate to call it ransomware recovery — and even that comes with conditions.
Backups do not prevent an attacker getting in, and they do not undo data being copied out of your business before anything was encrypted. Attackers know backups are the escape route, so backup systems and connected storage are frequently targeted first. A backup reachable with the same credentials as everything else may not survive the incident that made you need it.
What well-designed backups genuinely give you is a way back that does not depend on an attacker keeping their word, and considerably less pressure to pay. That is valuable — it is just not prevention.
Prevention is layered security: MFA, endpoint detection and response, email filtering, patching, least-privilege access and monitoring. We treat backup as the last layer, not the only one.
Could You Actually Recover?
A Backup That Has Never Been Restored Is a Theory
The questions worth asking before you need the answer, not after.
- Nobody has restored anything from backup in the last twelve months
- You know backups run; you do not know whether they finish
- The backup lives on the same network as what it protects
- There is one copy, in one place
- Nobody can say how long a full recovery would actually take
- Microsoft 365 and cloud application data are assumed to be covered
- Who declares a disaster, and who they call, has never been agreed
- The last time the plan was reviewed, the business was a different size
A backup job reporting success tells you data was written somewhere. Only a restore tells you the business could come back.
FAQ
Backup & Recovery FAQs
Will backups protect us from ransomware?
Backups are an important part of ransomware resilience, but they do not prevent an attack and they are not a complete answer on their own. Modern ransomware frequently targets backup systems specifically, and many incidents also involve data being copied out before anything is encrypted — which a restore does nothing to undo.
Backups belong alongside prevention and detection: endpoint protection, MFA, email security, patching and monitoring. Where backups earn their place is in shortening recovery and removing the pressure to pay.
How often should backups be tested?
Regularly and on a schedule, not only after something has gone wrong. A backup job reporting success tells you data was written; it does not confirm the data can be restored and used.
We perform recovery testing as part of managed backup so that the first real restore attempt is not during an actual emergency.
Do we need backup if everything is already in the cloud?
Yes. Cloud platforms are responsible for keeping their service available. Your business data within that service is still your responsibility.
Retention windows are limited, and data deleted by a user, removed by a departing employee, or affected by malware can pass out of reach. A separate backup gives you a recovery point you control.
How long would it take to get us running again?
That depends on what failed, how much data is involved, and the recovery approach your plan specifies — which is exactly why the target should be agreed in advance rather than discovered mid-incident.
We work through two questions with you: how much data your business can afford to lose (recovery point), and how long it can afford to be down (recovery time). Those answers drive the design.
How often should backups be tested?
Often enough that a failed restore is discovered by you rather than by an incident. Verification of individual jobs should be continuous; an actual restore should be exercised on a schedule you have agreed and can point to.
The number matters less than the fact that someone has done it recently and could tell you how long it took.
What is the difference between a backup and disaster recovery?
A backup is a copy of data. Disaster recovery is the answer to how the business keeps operating while that data is being put back — on what hardware, in what order, and who is doing it.
Plenty of businesses have the first and assume it gives them the second. It does not.
How long would recovery actually take?
That depends on how much data, where it is, what has to come back first and whether anyone has practised. It is a number that should be established and written down before it is needed, not estimated during an outage.
Establishing it is part of the work, and the answer occasionally changes what a business decides to protect.
Get Started
Review Your Backup Strategy
We’ll look at what is currently protected, what is not, and how long it would realistically take to get your business running again.