Why Rent Long-Term Storage When You Can Own?
Like storage rentals that provide a temporary solution to lock away furniture and other personal possessions, there's a limit to just how long you might want to pay for such a service. Similarly, why would you want to store vital files in a cloud-based virtual "locker" system if you have to pay prolonged service fees in order to do so?
When weighing the Pros and Cons of USB storage to Cloud storage, here are a few things you may want to consider:
- Data grows.
- where exactly is my information being stored in the Cloud- anyway?
- Unbeknownst to the user, who else might secretly have access to it?
- How long am I willing to store (and pay) for my vital information to be stored in the cloud?
- What if sensitive information is forgotten about years later? Can it still be accessed?
- How much downtime does the service suffer in a given year?
- Do I want to separate the user of the data from the administrator?
- Am I willing to keep up with the changes in the cloud service's “Terms of Service”?
On Costs
According to a recent poll conducted across a wide age-group of consumers in the United States, about 90 percent of those polled were open to the idea of storing their files online in a cloud service, but nearly 70 percent of them said they would be less inclined to pay for the service.
Remember that your data grows. How long are you willing to pay monthly or annual fees to a service that's storing your data? How much storage do you need now VS. how much you will need in the future? These are good questions to consider when looking into cloud storage.
On Safety and Convenience
Recent concerns have also been raised over just how safe and convenient cloud computing really is, after a recent demise of Megaupload, where millions of legal users were completely locked out with no access to their files. (Visit last week's post for more about this)
Universities and other organizations are becoming more hesitant about students and faculty using cloud-based services such as Dropbox.com and Google Apps due to rapidly-changing Terms of Service, and the inherent insecurities of protecting sensitive data, resulting in this recent announcement by the University of Delaware highlighting their concerns.
Where is that information actually being stored anyway? In a virtual storage world, do you really know exactly where your information is being stored, and who has access to it?
How long are you willing to pay to have your data stored within a Cloud solution? As your business grows, your data will grow with it, and your needs will change as well as the function of the data. You may want to section off and administrate certain types of data from others inside and outside of your organization. Will the Cloud offer a solution?
Cloud storage may be best for non-sensitive, shared information that has no detrimental value to a cyber-thief, or the type of data that would not put an organization out of business if the cloud service were to ever shut down temporarily or permanently. However, storing vast amounts of personal, sensitive, and vital information is best protected when the data is under physical protection.
Better Security with Physical Storage
Kanguru Defender® encrypted storage drives offer the most convenient, secure and flexible solutions for storing and working with large amounts of sensitive data. With easy access, organizations receive all of the security and control they want and expect, at an affordable one-time price. Data can be safely warehoused, backed-up, protected, transferred and conveniently managed, with one-hundred percent control over where the data is at all times. If the USB drive ends up stolen or lost, the password protection ensures the data cannot be accessed in the wrong hands. There are no worries of a possible disruption or downed Cloud interface that could potentially shut down a business for hours or days. Business can remain uninterrupted even with no access to the internet.
The beauty behind KRMC is that it puts the administrative capabilities into the hands of the organization and convenience of the Cloud, with the data remaining fully secure under the physical safety and management of the individual who needs it.
Additionally, Kanguru Remote Management Console, or KRMC, can further increase an organization's security and management of data by over 200%. As an optional feature that can be administrated through a self-hosted or cloud interface, KRMC provides administrators with the substantial ability to customize and manage their secure USB drives anywhere around the world, without worrying about the data. The brilliance behind KRMC is that it puts the administrative capabilities for the organization into the convenience of the Cloud, with the data remaining fully secure under the physical safety and management of the individual who holds it.
While KRMC is not a necessity to the user, KRMC offers administrators the robust management ability to customize, maintain and manage an organization's secure storage devices anywhere. This gives an organization vast power to know exactly where their sensitive data is at any given time.
Separating the Secure Data User and the Administrator
Furthermore, since the data is only stored on the secure drives, the administrators role is to simply administrate where the drives are at any given time. The benefits of this over common cloud storage is enormous. Unlike common cloud storage, where often the data is accessible to both the user and the administrator, the KRMC model separates the role of the data user from that of the storage administrator. Administrators simply manage the drives, while individual staff members manage and utilize the actual data.
With KRMC, administrators can restrict storage drives by domain or MAC address, passwords can be updated, managed and enhanced, and lost drives can even be disabled or wiped entirely if necessary within the console.
KRMC offers organizations vast security options over cloud storage solutions, which is a huge benefit to utility companies, financial industries, disaster recovery organizations and more. Click to learn more below.