Why Tape Isn’t Dead

By Guy Bunker | May 15, 2009 | Leave a Comment 

Guy Bunker

Some hackers took out a popular flight simulation website. Nothing too new there – hackers frequently take down websites, however in this case they managed to hack into both the servers that ran the site and also contained the backups. While disk based backup is now ‘the norm’ as a front line of backup – as restores are much quicker and easier, there is still a need for a second line, and tape is it. Nowadays you hope that you will never have to restore from tape, but it’s comforting to know it’s there – and this is a good case in point.

The other piece to learn from this is that if you are contemplating a cloud based service, then ask them what their backup strategy is. Having tape as a last line of defense is no bad thing.

Help Me… I’m Being Stolen

By Guy Bunker | March 2, 2009 | Leave a Comment 

Guy Bunker

Imagine a laptop that shouts if it has been stolen… well, imagine no more – it’s possible. Given that people don’t respond to car alarms or alarms in general, I’m not convinced that anyone will respond to a laptop shouting for help – or if the sound is turned down, whispering.

However, it is worth looking at how you might protect your system – shouting at the thief really isn’t going to make a difference. For potentially stolen or lost laptops (and smart phones for that matter), encryption is the way to go. Full disk encryption will prevent anyone accessing your data should you happen to lose your machine – so you can sleep well at night knowing someone isn’t stealing your bank account details from it, or logging into the corporate network as you. And… while we’re talking laptops… also remember to back it up… so when it disappears, all your hard work or digital photos can be recovered – from the backup. So this means, if you have a USB disk with the backup… don’t keep it with your laptop!

Ransomware Is Back… And It’s Bad

By Guy Bunker | June 18, 2008 | 2 Comments 

Guy Bunker

Just so you know – ransomware is making a comeback. For those of you who haven’t come across the term, this is where your machine gets infected with some malware, perhaps through a virus attached to an email, but these days it is more likely to be through a download (especially from a social networking site). The malware encrypts all the data on your drive and then offers to decrypt it – for $50. This is an interesting amount, $50, not much or at least not much to worry about – if it was $5000 then you might think twice. Of course the question is… how are you going to pay them?!?!? Perhaps give them your credit card number or bank details… and they will take $50. And the other $1000+… So, perhaps its better not to pay!

How can you prevent it…? Well ensuring that you have anti-virus and anti-malware software installed and up to date is a good start. Then just be vigilant – make sure that when you are asked to download something, (a) you really need to and (b) it is from who you expect. As ‘insurance’, take regular backups – and keep them somewhere safe, not attached to the machine (as they will then be encrypted as well if they are an external hard disk or USB device.) Then if disaster strikes at least you have a copy. You will need to reformat the machine and reinstall the operating system, but at least you haven’t given away your credit card or bank account details and you still have your data.