Hi Vinny
I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on this one. I take backups home weekly and offsite to AC secure land nightly, but I do most of my backups of AC and more daily.
I think we do a disservice to users when we recommend thumbdrives, simply because most do ONE backup and then take it home and think that's enough. Why take it home? Do they just turn around and bring it back? Makes no sense.
What I would like to hear from users (because I really do not want to hear about one disaster) and those who talk about backups is their strategy. Maybe they are making a local backup and taking another home.
Let's face it. Backups at work are far more important than taking them home. There is FAR greater chance of something happening at work to the computer than a natural disaster. So, tens of backups at the office are worth far more than one or two at home.
Chance of virus or corrupt data or missing file not discovered for greater than seven days, probably 1 in 5,000.
Chance of a fire or flood (the big two we hear about all the time) probably 1 in 50,000.
Chance of losing a flash drive that is one 1.5 inches long and 1/2 inch wide, probably 1 in 250. Hell, I have probably lost at least five flash drives in the past few years, none that contained much of anything to worry about.
Why not encrypted when 1) the software is simple and free or 2) most flash drives over $25 come with them.
Why do we encrypt the backups we send over the Internet? This sort of rhetorical in that it's obvious, but again, it is much more likely one will lose his or her flash drive before some hacker will steal his or her data off a server between here and Houston, Texas.
