Protecting your cloud data

"cloud data" could mean a lot of things. In this blog entry, I want to focus on cloud data as the data you store in the cloud (the Internet). And, to get you to think about how you would conduct your job, business, or personal life if that access was no longer available?

Why would this happen? Well, there's the obvious - natural disasters, power outages, which lead to temporary loss of Internet access. But, let' also remember to consider the not-so obvious. For instance, what if for some reason your Gmail, Hotmail, or Yahoo mail account was suspended, hacked, or the provider was down (think DOS attack).

Don't think it could happen? What if Gmail decides to suspend access to your account for suspicion of malice (even if it's a wrong accusation)? Maybe someone hacks your account and changes the password.

Sure, these might sound improbable, but not impossible. I'm trying to wake you up to think about what forms of your data are in a precarious state residing only in online repositories. In other words, if your sole record of Phone numbers, email addresses, policy numbers, important notes, etc. are kept in an online repository (google docs, yahoo mail, drop box), then you *Don't* have full control over the access to it.

Okay, so what's my solution? Local replicas. Many, but not all of these online webmail services have some means by which you can make duplicate copies on your local computer.

For instance, if you have a yahoo account, you can also download all that email (and valuable contact information) into Outlook by using a POP email connection. yes, you might have to have a paid subscription to that, but just do it for one month, long enough to get a copy of all that data.

Another feature is exporting of contacts into a CSV file. CSV files can by opened with Excel or can be imported in to several contact management software tools.

I'm not going to go into the details of how to setup POP accounts or export/import CSV files - that's not the scope of this blog entry. I really just want you to stop and think about the delicate nature of your online data and how your access to it is NOT GUARANTEED.

Making a local copy of that data that you normally store in the cloud is one way to dramatically increase the likelihood that the data is accessible to you in spite of outages or other reasons.

And, here's one last thing to think about: You know all those business contacts you have saved in your work email? You think you'll have time to get a copy of all those if get let-go? Most companies shut off access to computer and email resources BEFORE they inform the employee of termination.

Aren't these business contacts likely to be some of the people you're going to reach out to if you have to go job hunting?

It's not a tremendous amount of work to make these local copies of your data and you'd be so glad you did situation ever occurred where access was shut off.