There are many online data backup vendors available on the internet, and more coming on board by the day it seems. If you have read our reviews or subscribe to our newsletter you will be aware that not all providers are created equal. Many offer robust, sophisticated backup tools appropriate for protecting critical business or personal data from disaster while others fancy eye candy and unnecessary bells and whistles to get you on board. Unfortunately, there are bad apples in every bunch and a large number of lower cost solutions are cutting important corners in favor of economics these days. Before you trust an online backup service with your vital data, it is critical for you to understand what features are available and how important these may be to you. Lets start with how secure is your data:

1. Does your online backup service use encryption when you transfer and they store your data? Even though most services use encryption to safeguard your data as it travels the Internet, many do not use encryption when they store your data on their servers. Yeah that's right, in fact some even state in their terms of service that encrypting your data is not permissible.

Huh? In fact, for resources preservation they are counting that many people will store the same files, so they don't have to back up the same file more than once. If someone else accesses that file, they could be giving them access to one of your files instead. Probably not a big deal if you're just saving MP3 music or video files, but wouldn't you prefer your personal information, say like passwords or financial information, be kept private and secure? Yikes!

2. How easy is their software to install? Do you need to hire outside help or get your brother-in-law to install and maintain your backup software?

Most online backup services are designed to be used by professional IT folks. Some of these services require intimate knowledge of Windows/Mac in order to make a backup. A couple great examples; did you know that your Microsoft Outlook email file is stored in a hidden folder multiple levels deep in your PC? Or your iTunes music is likely stored in your My Documents Music folder which can be tricky to find using your backup service software. If you didn't know these then you may have a difficult time backing it up.

3. Does your online backup service keep multiple versions of files (versioning)?

To keep storage costs down, a lot of backup services keep only a single copy of each file. On the surface this might seem fine to you. However, if we dig a little deeper though, what would happen if some of your critical files got corrupted by a virus and you failed to notice until after your most recent backup? Yes, that's right you just overwrote the good file with the bad. Ouch! This could be an interesting proposition when it comes time to recover.

4. Does your backup service update the whole file every time it changes?

Backup services lacking versioning features need to back up the whole file each time it changes. This is not so cumbersome for smaller files like Word documents, but backing up your entire mail file every time you get new mail is not feasible (or possibly databases). If your mail file is large (250 MB plus is not unusual), it could take many hours to back up just that one file. If you get new email message during that period, will backup start all over? Good question. Many services handle this issue by backing up nightly or worse only weekly. If disaster shows it's ugly head, how much new email would you lose since the last time your backup ran? Well some services deal with this by not backing up your email at all. Be careful on this one.

5. Is your online backup continuous (syncing service)? Or does your online backup service only back up files when you tell it to (scheduled)?

To be considered an adequate backup solution, it is not enough to simply have an online storage repository on the internet. Periodically/randomly pushing your files up to your online storage will only work if you are fortunate enough to do so just prior to your PC dying. Our luck is not that fortunate, is yours? Keep in mind even if your online backup service has a scheduled backup agent that runs say weekly, how much data would you loose since the last point it ran?

6. What happens if your internet connection is interrupted, drops or you unplug your laptop to dash off to work?

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