Whether you’re a large conglomerate, a small business, or the average joe that gets by in the world today, there are some things you need to know about data. The digital age is ruled by data, and every single bit of information found in a digital device contains data. As somebody who is living in such a world, it only makes sense that you’d know how data works, how to handle it, and how to take advantage of what you know. The age-old adage of “knowledge is power” still exists today, albeit found on computer screens and phone devices.
There are different approaches that we could take on this topic. Data protection such as antivirus and malware security. Data processing, such as cloud services and hybrid clouds. Even data backup, such as NAS servers and Veeam cloud backup. All of these terms have a vital function in keeping data in the world running and useful. We’ll explore them one by one and see how you could benefit from them.
Data protection – A new platform for information means that there will also be new threats that would attempt to take advantage of such data. Identity theft, malicious software, ransomware, and other forms of cybercrime are on the rise. It only makes sense then to protect yourself from such malware. Because we want to protect our data, we should also learn how malware works.
For example, ransomware is a type of malware that is first downloaded to your devices through a malicious link. Once inside your device, the ransomware then proceeds to encrypt all of your data in such a way that the only method of opening it is by the attackers’ programs. The ransomware would then display a message saying that you need to pay somebody (the attackers) a certain amount of money in order for them to release your hostage files. As someone who wants to protect themselves from ransomware, the best course of action is to always avoid suspicious links, executable files, and emails.
Data processing – There are big leaps in the amount of data that a single person uses nowadays. Multiply that exponentially, and that’s the amount of data business companies have to process in order to make the best out of their products and services. For example, a shopping mall has to track its customers’ behaviors and see their patterns of buying. Rearranging the shelves into which convenience is the highest priority would then lead to more customers buying more things. This type of data processing could not be done by a single computer alone.
Employing more resources for cloud services is what the big companies do. They hire data processing cloud services in order to handle the raw information they have accumulated. Cloud services have far more capable computers, data storage, and bandwidth to process data in a faster way.
Data backup – Now that it’s been established just how much data we consume and make, it is then imperative to find places to store and back up such data. Digital information is just like our hard documents. We store our important files in a folder and keep them locked away in a safe environment. Data can also be damaged or corrupted, so keeping a backup of them and storing them in a different device is always a good idea.
Although data storage and data backup are different things, they are often used interchangeably. This is because most data storage services via the cloud nowadays have an automatic data backup. This means that your data is automatically uploaded to the cloud storage, making your life easier and hassle-free. You only need to avail of their services, and even your devices with different platforms can communicate with each other and open the cloud. This brings an extra level of convenience that could only be achieved with cloud services, and it’s a good idea to avail of such services for your data’s sake.