Burned by Data Losses, Companies Increasingly Turn to Cloud for Backup

With a significant share of organizations still experiencing potentially crippling data losses, many are increasing their backup and disaster recovery efforts, according to a recent survey from Unitrends. The accompanying report, titled “The State of Cloud and Data Protection 2018,” indicates that companies are more likely to consider the cloud as a backup option than they did two years ago. Businesses are also more likely to test their disaster recovery plan at least once a year than they did in the recent past. And fewer organizations today are choosing to not have a disaster recovery site. More than 800 IT pros took part in the research. The following slide show presents highlights from the survey, with charts provided courtesy of Unitrends.

Three of 10 survey respondents said their company has experienced data loss over the last year. This is due to natural disasters, internal threats, ransomware and other cyber-attacks.

When asked how much data their company backs up, 27 percent of respondents said at least 100 terabytes. In 2016, just 11 percent indicated the same.

With regard to backup methods, 36 percent of respondents said their company uses disks first, then cloud options. In 2016, just 23 percent said their organization does this.

Nearly three of five respondents said their company uses the cloud for backup, archiving or recovery. In 2016, just 48 percent reported the same.

Technology companies are most likely to use the cloud for backup, archiving or recovery, as cited by 68 percent of respondents at these businesses. Health care organizations ranked second, as cited by 64 percent of respondents in that industry.

Three-quarters of respondents said their organization tests its disaster recovery plan at least once a year—with 19 percent doing so every month. In 2016, just 63 percent of respondents said their company conducted this testing at least once a year.

Fewer companies are opting to not have a disaster recovery site—27 percent today compared with 32 percent in 2016. Among organizations that do have a disaster recovery site, 41 percent are investing in physical, secondary sites and 32 percent are investing in cloud-based models.

Two-thirds of respondents at organizations not yet using the cloud for backup/disaster recovery indicate that they plan to do so within a year. In 2016, only 45 percent of respondents at companies not yet using the cloud for backup/disaster recovery indicated that they plan to do so within a year.

Nearly one in five respondents at organizations that aren’t using the cloud for backup/disaster recovery cited cost as the top factor. Security concerns also loom large, as cited by 13 percent of these respondents.