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Protection Triangle
What's a Protection Triangle? In some aspects, it's not really new. Over the past few years, we've discovered some people and their companies had a lot less problems than others.
The people and companies that had three important things in their computer systems enabled them to work more efficiently, lose less time, lose less work, have less down time and, generally speaking, they had more reliable computer systems.
We called these three things "The Protection Triangle" because this combination seemed to provide a protective shield against computer problems. Now, it didn't get rid of all problems but we would only pay "house calls" to see those clients every three months or so. The customers without it needed our services a lot more frequently.
It sounds too simple to be true, however, the three things that comprise the protection triangle are:
Anti-Virus
"It hasn't happened to us yet." We hear that a lot, so you can relax. The thing is, that's what we hear just before we have to make an emergency visit to help you recover as much data as possible after an innocuous little virus has infected every machine in the office. The average cost to recover from a virus is $2,316.00.
Simple Solution: Anti-Virus is a less costly solution than fixing a virus infection. You have to have it.
Firewalls
Picture this. 10,000 hackers with nothing better to do download prewritten scripts to check every computer on the internet for security holes. Unfortunately for all of us, Windows has a few security holes. Checking the entire internet takes about 20 hours.
The scripts generate a list of computers that they can hack. With a little more work, they can take control of your machine. And you won't even know they've gotten in.
The only thing saving you is a.) these hackers aren't all geniuses (beware of the ones that are), and b.) there are so many computers on the list that your risk of being hacked turns out to be like a run at the slot machines in Vegas. How lucky do you feel against 10,000 hackers all running the same scripts?
Another simple solution: A Firewall is easier and less expensive to install -- compared to the costs and pain of fixing a hostile takeover of your computer system. You've got to have a firewall.
Backup
While anti-virus and firewalls protect against a lot of potential problems you need an automatic, daily, offsite backup to cover you against what's the remaining problems: mainly, hardware problems; physical problems like theft, fire, flood and other random acts; and the remaining rogue virus or creative hack.
Automatic, because humans are imperfect. Daily, because you don't need any more work than that. Offsite, because if someone steals your computer they will probably take the backup that is sitting next to the computer, too. This has really happened.
The icing on the cake: You've got to have automatic, daily, offsite backup
There things will probably never happen to you. If you’re not so sure, set your company up with the Protection Triangle and sleep a little easier tonight. We're here at QuantumStep to help you. Call us at 410.349.1616 for the details.
Also, check out our Protection Triangle Checklist for help evaluating if you and your companies computers meet the requirements of the Protection Triangle and insure the maximum reliablity possible for your computers.
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