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Secure Backup
for the Small Office |
By
Lauren Simonds
July 13, 2005
Businesses come in all shapes and sizes and so do
their data backup needs. Products and services aimed
at large enterprises abound, but for a small business
run by a sole proprietor or one with only a handful
of employees, finding a solution that's tailored
to your needs and budget can feel like trying to
buy two pork chops at Costco.
DataFort — a company with offices in the U.K.
and in New York that provides highly secure, online
data back up for large enterprises — now offers
PCFort, a hosted, Web-based service designed to
provide the little guys with the same level of secure
backup at an affordable price.
Marcie Terman, DataFort's chief operating officer,
said the company created PCFort specifically for
small businesses that need to back up desktop and
notebook PCs and not for server environments. "We
designed PCFort with the smallest of small-business
owners in mind. These people are incredibly stretched
as they take care of their companies, their families
and maybe even try to pursue other interests,"
she said. "Data backup tends to fall by the
wayside."
Terman emphasized ease-of-use as a key factor, calling
the service "dead simple" to use. "After
PCFort completes the first, full data backup [of
directories you determine], it subsequently backs
up only new and changed data," she said. "By
default, it saves everything stored in the My Documents
folder every evening at 10 p.m. local time, but
you can specify the directories you want saved and
configure the backup to take place at your convenience."
Security
For the past five years, DataFort has developed
its own high-end data backup service for large companies
across the United Kingdom. Terman said PCFort customers
benefit from that development expertise, especially
in the area of security. PCFort offers the same
level of security — 256-bit AES encryption
— that DataFort offers its big-business clients.
It's also the same encryption that the federal government
uses internally, while online banking and credit
card transactions use 128-bit encryption.
"Since we already had a product for big business,
it didn't cost us anything extra to provide that
level of security to SOHO customers," Terman
said. "We also store PCFort customer data in
the same high-end storage facility as our enterprise
customers."
Security measures at the storage facility include:
redundant smoke detection and fire retardation systems,
multiple onsite generators to maintain consistent
power levels, bombproof glass, closed-circuit television
cameras and keycard access.
Support
Terman said that tech support for SMBs is crucial
and claims that PCFort 24/7 e-mail support with
a two-hour response guarantee is one of the best
support policies available. She added that most
problems arise when people first open an account
and need help with, for example, resolving individual
firewall issues.
She also said the service can efficiently support
"enormous numbers of customers" because
the software maintains information about the customer's
PC. "We don't keep any personal information,"
she said. "We keep track of things like your
PC's connectivity history, how strong the Web connection
is or how much hard disk space your PC has left."
Terman likened the situation to having your computer's
"medical" history. It's designed to let
the tech support people find trouble areas faster.
"Instead of pulling the information from the
customer, it's already there, and we can serve them
faster," she said.
System Requirements
In order to set up an account, you'll need:
Windows 98 or later
One gigabyte free disk space This is essential if
you are backing up large files
Internet Explorer Version 4 or greater
68MB RAM
Pricing
The PCFort service starts at $11.88 per year for
250MB of data backup. Terman said this level is
typically sufficient for backing up Word documents
and spreadsheets that, for example, a single accountant
might produce in a year's time.
For $35.88 per year, you can buy 1GB of backup space,
which the company said is good for anyone who needs
to back up Web site content, business files and
the odd graphic image.
Terman estimates that the service's space limit
maxes out at approximately 20GB transferred over
a DSL line, citing the customer's Internet connection
as a factor. "We don't recommend going over
20GB of data," she said. "That's the point
where you need to consider a different backup solution.
I want people to have a good experience using PCFort.
I don't want people feeling tense, I want them to
feel comfortable."
Lauren Simonds is the managing
editor of SmallBusinessComputing.com |
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