Owners Are Responsible For Customer Data

It’s great to know that you have your physical computer systems (desktop or laptop) computer secured but what about the customers’ data?

Many business owners never think of backing up their own data as well as customer data. Back ups are important and they save a lot of time and headaches when you have to recover data. There’s nothing like losing a bunch of files with no backup reference or point. That means that you have to recreate everything that you’ve ever did and that’s not fun.SOHO business owners that have customers in legal, medical or psychological professions must take extra steps to ensure that data is backed up and put into a safe place within their home or off site. This may even mean investing in data processing insurance that has an errors and omissions rider.

An errors and omissions rider protects you against disasters that may happen to data which is not your fault. Let’s say that your office building has water damage from a hurricane, fire or something out of your control, you are automatically insured against it provided that you went through all means to secure the data.

Most SOHO business owners should back up their systems and store the backup in an industry certified fireproof safe. Safes can be purchased from your local hardware store or a place like Home Depot.If a clients’ personal data is not secure, then under certain laws, you can be sued for negligence. If it’s medical data, you could be punished to the extent of the law and pay enormous fines and you could lose your medical license.

You can buy Zip Drives or Tape Drives to back up customer data. Mostly all computer systems come with CD-RW drives which will allow you to back up certain directories on your computer. If you want to keep data offsite with a professional backup company, you can do that too if your budget will permit it.

Make sure that you protect your data and your client’s data which will help you avoid lawsuits and legal action against your SOHO business.