Phones get lost, or more commonly, wet.

A computer stops working suddenly, gets wet, dropped, orinfected.

Messages disappear, or accounts get locked out, especiallyWhatsApp messages.

By then, it’s too late.

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A Situation We See All Too Often

Someone came in with a phone that wouldn’t turn on.

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“All the photos are on there,” they said.“Everything.”

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There was no backup. Some things were recovered, but many were not.

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1. The Basic Rule: 3 Copies of What Matters

If something is important, it should exist in three places:

1.       Your main device, phone or computer

2.       A backup copy nearby, like an external drive

3.       A backup somewhere else, (cloud like OneDrive, Backblaze, Google Drive,) or another location

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Why Three?

Because things fail, devices break, accounts get locked, and of course they tend to fail together.

At Rubin IT, we regularly see how just one missing copy can make recovery impossible.

A common scenario is a computer dies, there goes one copy.The external hasn’t been plugged in in months and all the recent data hasn’t been backed up. Hopefully the cloud copy was running. Or the cloud hasn’t worked due to sketchy internet. Hopefully one of the other two was recent.

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2. Know What’s Worth Saving

Focus on what would be painful to lose and keep it simple.

·       Family photos and videos

·       Important documents

·       Work files

·       Contacts and messages

If losing it would upset you, it’s worth backing up. There are many simple, reasonably priced backup or sync solutions available, from classic Backblaze to sync via OneDrive, Google Drive, iCloud, etc.

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Another Common Situation

Someone needed an important detail from an old conversation.
“It’s all in WhatsApp,” they said.
But the account was no longer accessible. The messages were gone.

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3. Messages Are Not a Safe Place to Store Information

Gmail and WhatsApp can feel permanent.

They’re not, especially WhatsApp, which people rely on heavily for real correspondence, but they aren’t aware it’s really all juststored on the phone.

They can:

·       Be deleted

·       Be lost

·       Become inaccessible due to notorious Gmail and WhatsApp lockout issues

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We often meet people who relied on chat history or free Gmail for really significant business deals and were devastated when it wasn’tthere.

If something matters:

·       Save it outside the chat

·       Email it to yourself

·       Keep it in a proper place

Critical WhatsApp and Gmail info MUST be tied to a number that gets SMS.

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4. Make It Simple and Automatic

The easiest way to stay protected is to set things up once.

·       Turn on automatic phone backups. They are usually very reasonably priced.

·       Use cloud storage for important files. For critical Word and Excel, OneDrive is even free and built into every Windows computer.

·       Occasionally copy files to an external drive. There are free and simple programs for this too.

You don’t need to manage it daily, just set it up and let it run.

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5. A Small Check That Makes a Big Difference

Ideally, once in a while:

·       Open your backup

·       Make sure your files are really there

A backup only helps if it’s actually running and backing up your data.

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Final Thought

Most people who lose data say the same thing:

“I didn’t think it would happen.”

From what we see at Rubin IT, a few simple steps can prevent most of these situations.

A little preparation now can save a lot of stress later.

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