Despite the wide range of powerful services, and the many features and benefits of Microsoft 365, the application is not without drawbacks. Data loss and protection support being amongst them.
In a previous blog, we discussed MS 365 migration, and how to plan for this. Clearly data loss remains a major concern for small-medium businesses moving to the Cloud. Especially as Microsoft’s backup policies can’t guarantee a complete and quick recovery of lost data.
In this blog post, we’re going to discuss what you need to do once you have Office 365. The backup policies available to you, and how to ensure that your data is fully protected and secured in the Cloud.
According to a study by the University of Texas, a whopping 94% of companies that suffer a catastrophic data loss don’t survive. Moreover, 43% never reopen and 51% close within two years. Another research shows that 70% of small businesses that experience a major data loss go out of business within a year.
This can be disheartening for small businesses. Undoubtedly, no organisation wants to be in the vulnerable position of losing company data. So what can you do to ensure your data is backed up and secure with Microsoft 365?
Microsoft’s responsibilities regarding backup and recovery
Microsoft has some backup policies in place within Office 365 to prevent data loss. These backup policies are also supposed to help users determine who is responsible for data loss.
The aim is to ascertain who bears responsibility for such data loss. It can be Microsoft’s fault, in which case Microsoft takes responsibility for backup/recovery. Alternatively, the fault can originate from the customer’s side. In this case, the responsibility of data recovery falls on the customer.
Microsoft’s responsibilities:
- Hardware failure
- Software failure (on the server’s side)
- Natural disaster
- Power outage (in a data center)
Customer’ responsibilities
- Human error
- Software errors (on the customer’s side)
- Malware attacks
- Hacker attacks
- Malicious insiders
Office 365 Backup Policies
Office 365 does have backup policies to protect the user in the event of a data loss. However, retrieval of lost data isn’t always possible.
Even in cases where such data can actually be recovered, the process tends to be time-consuming, tedious and complicated. Moreover, the retention policies and capabilities vary for each Microsoft application included in the Cloud. Finally, the default retention periods for storage of deleted data are often not long enough.
For instance:
Sharepoint
Items deleted from SharePoint are stored in a secondary recycle bin for 93 days after which they are deleted permanently. As a result, that data becomes irretrievable.
Exchange Online
In Exchange Online, deleted emails are automatically sent to the Deleted Items folder where they are retained for 30 days. Items deleted from this folder are subsequently sent to a secondary ‘Recoverable Items’ folder, with a 14-day default retention period.
One Drive
Like Exchange Online, One Drive has a 30-day retention period during which items belonging to deleted accounts can be recovered. However, once the 30 days have elapsed, any data deleted cannot be retrieved.
The Bottom Line
The bottom line is Microsoft 365 service-level agreement addresses availability. This application doesn’t specialise in data backup and recovery. Ultimately, the responsibility of data backup and protection of highly sensitive company data or mission critical applications in the Cloud – lies on the customer.
How can No Problem IT help?
Granted, Microsoft does a number of good things in order to safeguard their customers’ data. However, Office 365 backup and retention policies are NOT a substitute for a complete backup and restore solution. Office 365 backup and retention policies are not reliable as they can only protect you from data loss in very limited scenarios.
If you want secure and resilient data storage and to mitigate the risk of significant data loss, it would be in your organisation’s best interest to partner with third party backup solutions. Ones that specialise in data recovery in an Office 365 environment.
This is where No Problem IT comes in. As a Managed IT Service provider, we offer Office 365 Backup as a Service to small-medium businesses within Greater London. We provide our customers with full protection against data loss in the case of a catastrophic event that wipes out large volumes of customer data.
Our services also include an automated and daily backup and recovery solution. Therefore, our customers do not have to worry about data losses due to human errors, rogue employees, data breaches, malware attacks, software and hardware failures. This refers to any type of failure that might lead to a temporary or permanent loss of data.
NPIT’s cloud backup solution ensures that your organisation’s data in Office 365 is sufficiently backed up and easily retrievable. Ultimately quickly restoring lost data to the appropriate application in the event of data loss.
Our solution is automated, efficient and easy to use. Let us help you avoid errors that can be avoided while you focus on work.
You can read more about our business continuity and data recovery services or contact us today for a complete backup and recovery solution for your Microsoft Office 365 application.
