When most businesses still had their own data centers, their information should normally be backed up by themselves. Many businesses now believe that this will be arranged for them by their SaaS supplier. Unfortunately, with all the related hazards, this is not always the case. Read here how in four steps you can develop your own cloud backup strategy.

More and more businesses are turning to cloud-based office software like Office 365. This implies that if the service fails, the supplier, in this case, Microsoft, will be liable for both accessibility and disaster recovery. The data on the platform, however, is the property of the companies themselves, so it is their responsibility to protect it. However, information may still be lost or unavailable, e.g. because of:

• Unintentional removal
• Cyber attacks and ransomware
• File corruption
• Intentional removal

This means: the need for excellent safety of data is higher than ever before. Cloud users need to take action and create an efficient backup policy all the more. For this purpose, the following measures are essential, as an instance, we take Office 365 for the sake of comfort.

Determine the policy and requirement

Every company’s backup demands are distinct. For instance, certain legislation and other laws need to be complied with in some industries. Therefore, to begin with, an organization must establish its own service level contract (lettuce) and define the data backup criteria. I suggest that you take the following into account:

1. Recovery point objective: How often does an organization’s information need to be backed up so that the quantity of information lost in case of a power failure is no higher than acceptable for company activities?
2. Recovery time objective: How long can information be retrieved after a catastrophe or malfunction, and what is acceptable?
3. Recovery granularity objective: How long can information be retrieved after a catastrophe or malfunction, and what is acceptable?
4. Content: What types of content and which platforms do you want to back up?
5. Retention Period: How soon do you want your information to be backed up? And does this vary by place of the storage, such as Microsoft Teams and SharePoint versus Exchange?

Determine how this applies to Office 365

Then see how Office 365 can apply your backup policy. For this purpose, Office 365 provides the following alternatives according to the above criteria:

• Thirty days, at the End, User Recycle Bin, thirty days in the Second-Stage Recycle Bin, and three more days using PowerShell.
• Removal after the employee/user has left the company.
• It is important to note that Project Online is part and fully backed up of the content database. There is no separate option to recover a single object for that reason.

Third-Party Solutions

If the built-in backup feature in Office 365 does not fulfill the policies of your organization, Gartner and Forrester recommend that third-party alternatives be considered and implemented. Keep in mind that while Office 365 backups are advertised by many providers, they often only give export alternatives from Exchange Online to a.pst file. Office 365 is more than just an Exchange, besides causing data protection problems. The following places can also store numerous significant information:

• SharePoint
• OneDrive for Business
• Office 365 Groups
• Microsoft Teams
• Project Online
• Dynamics 365

You should also consider the following problems when comparing distinct providers with backup services.

• Use of your own private encryption keys,  so that you always manage your backup data yourself and not the supplier.
• Use of different storage providers. It is an alternative to placing backups with distinct storage suppliers, and perhaps even in your own data center if you want to further restrict the hazards. Pay attention to all the advantages and disadvantages offered by distinct storage suppliers such as bandwidth or additional information transfer expenses.
• It is also essential to manage the release of SaaS alternatives from third parties. Cloud suppliers tend to introduce fresh product updates rapidly, which sometimes disrupt the cloud environments of a customer. Therefore, good and regular management of the release from a third party SaaS supplier is essential.

Finally, ensure cloud suppliers have ISO safety certification for the systems they are using (MSFT, AWS, Google) and for their own infrastructure. ISO 27001 provides a solid foundation.

Monitoring and Verification

It is essential that it continues to be controlled through (1) backup dashboards and logs and (2) periodic retrieval tests after all information is stored in an organization’s backup. This allows you to determine whether current processes are working properly and whether protected goods can still be efficiently restored. I propose the following: regularity:

You should be able to create a fresh or better backup approach for Office 365 with these four steps. Intuitive third-party solutions can assist you quickly expand the normal backup features of Microsoft if you have to fulfill rigorous (legal) demands. In any event, I hope these measures will assist you in your manner to better-protecting Office 365 business information and avoiding unwanted data loss.