Why Endpoint Backup Is Critical for Your Remote Workforce?

Working from home is the new norm in today’s business landscape. Since the pandemic, the number of remote workers has increased significantly, largely due to the growing emphasis on work-life balance. Consequently, endpoint protection has become more critical than ever. These endpoints are outside the in-house IT security perimeter, making them vulnerable to cyber threats. 

According to Verizon, 90 percent of cyberattacks and 70 percent of data breaches originate from endpoint devices. Therefore, businesses must strengthen their endpoint security environment to overcome the evolving cyber threats. 

One essential safeguard in this ecosystem is Endpoint Backup—a critical layer that ensures data from remote devices is securely backed up and can be swiftly restored in the event of a cyber incident or data loss.

Why Do You Need Endpoint Backup?

Remote Devices Are More Vulnerable to Data Loss

In the case of a traditional IT infrastructure, businesses can create a protective data security shield around the office network. However, endpoint protection becomes complicated when employees start working from remote locations (especially on their devices). It increases the risk of device theft, unauthorized access, and ransomware attacks.

Without a backup solution, these threats can lead to the loss or compromise of critical client data. 

Preventing Human Errors

Humans make mistakes. Employees working remotely on endpoints may accidentally delete files or overwrite folders without realizing it. You cannot undo these actions without a backup solution.    

That’s why having automated endpoint backups is important to secure and restore data quickly, minimize disruptions, and prevent data loss.        

Ransomware Is on the Rise

Ransomware has become one of the preferred methods of cyberattacks globally. According to Statista, 59% of organizations worldwide were targets of a ransomware attack in 2024. Ransomware attackers target vulnerable endpoints through emails or malicious applications to encrypt business data.

Endpoint backup ensures that businesses still have access to the data and don’t need to pay the attackers. 

Compliance Requirements 

Adhering to regulatory compliances such as HIPAA, GDPR, IRS WISP, or FINRA is challenging in a remote working environment. All these regulations require businesses to implement multiple security protocols, such as data encryption, multi-factor authentication, and backup. 

For instance, the HIPAA Security Rule mandates covered entities and business associates to implement contingency plans for emergencies affecting ePHI systems. These include data backup, disaster recovery, and emergency mode operation plans.  

Therefore, it is imperative to deploy endpoint backup to meet these regulations. 

BYOD Increases Complexity

Various organizations have started implementing BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) policies in their operations, which empower employees to work remotely on personal devices. Although BYOD reduces capital expenses, it also makes organizations vulnerable to data threats. According to CrowdStrike, 22% of organizations reported that their employees downloaded malware on personal devices last year. 

Therefore, a robust endpoint backup solution is necessary for BYOD devices. 

Cyber Insurance Requires Strong Backup Measures

Cyber insurance is necessary to protect your business from the aftermath of a massive security incident. However, insurance companies offer coverage only to those organizations that show their preparedness to tackle cyber attacks, which includes an endpoint backup policy. 

Therefore, businesses must use advanced endpoint backup solutions to qualify for cyber insurance and reduce their premiums by meeting backup standards.

What Are The Benefits of Endpoint Backup?

Prevents Reputational Damage

Data security is the prime concern for clients and vendors when they do business with an organization. When a cyber-attack targets an employee’s endpoint device, or it gets stolen, the employee can lose sensitive client data. You need to notify the client, which may lead to the client losing trust and even leaving you. An endpoint backup solution can help you recover data easily and avoid this situation.     

Protects Against Financial Losses

In February 2024, UnitedHealth paid the ransom of USD 22 million to the BlackCat/ALPHV ransomware gang. Ransomware can inflict huge financial losses on businesses, which can be tough to recover from. An endpoint backup solution ensures you can still access the data, even if the company is under a ransomware attack. 

Reduces Additional Issues for the IT Team

Fewer cyber threats mean less effort. Data breach incidents put a lot of responsibility on your IT team. They need to constantly monitor endpoints, identify the entry point, perform root cause analysis, and more. An endpoint backup ensures quick data recovery, reducing the burden on your IT team. Additionally, you can opt for managed endpoint backup services to eliminate in-house IT hassles. 

Must-Have Features Of An Endpoint Backup Solution

Protecting remote endpoints requires more than just antivirus. Discover the essential features every endpoint backup solution should offer to ensure complete data resilience.

Instant Data Recovery

The primary objective of data backup is recovery. Hence, the endpoint backup you choose must be able to recover and restore data quickly. Moreover, a cloud-based backup ensures real-time data visibility from any device or location.  

Automation

Manual backups can be an additional burden for the IT team. Moreover, human intervention can lead to improper scheduling and delayed recovery. An endpoint backup solution must implement automatic backup to eliminate the manual factor. Automation ensures backups on the right schedule, reducing the risk of errors and delays. 

Encryption at Rest and in Transit

Cyber attackers can compromise business data from the endpoint to cloud servers during backup. Data encryption ensures that the data is incomprehensible to attackers when they access it. Hence, an endpoint backup solution must deploy data encryption in transit and at the storage level.    

Centralized Management Console

When employees work remotely, managing backups from all devices can be daunting. The endpoint backup solution must have a unified dashboard for IT teams to manage backups. Moreover, the IT team must be able to update backup policies on the same platform and also recover data during a security incident.   

Support for Multiple Devices

BYOD policies enable remote employees to work on their preferred devices and platforms, such as Android, Linux, or macOS. Therefore, an advanced backup solution must be compatible with all platforms and offer the same performance.   

Data Versioning

An endpoint backup solution must have the data versioning feature. Data versioning is the process of storing different versions or states of a file. You might have seen this feature in Google Docs. 

This feature is useful when you have accidentally overwritten a file, or someone has altered the current version. In such cases, you can simply roll back to the previous versions and start working instantly.   

Benefits of Opting for Endpoint Backup Services

Data backup is essential for any IT security environment. However, deploying an in-house endpoint backup solution can be expensive for a business. Managed backup services offer businesses cloud data storage that is more viable than in-house backup. Let’s discuss the major benefits. 

Anytime Access

A cloud-based endpoint backup service enables you to access the data backup from remote devices. Hence, if you are traveling and want to access the data, all you need to do is visit the cloud portal through a web browser or client software and enter the right credentials. 

Automated Scalability

As your business grows, the volume of data processed and backed up daily also increases. Consequently, you need to scale the backup infrastructure according to demand. In the case of an in-house backup solution, regular investments are needed to purchase backup servers. 

A managed endpoint backup provider stores your data in cloud servers with automated scalability. Hence, the IT infrastructure scales accordingly as your data storage requirements grow.   

Enhanced Data Security

Data backup can be subject to data threats if not secured under an advanced infrastructure. However, deploying such an infrastructure can be expensive for businesses to deploy on-premises. 

Managed endpoint backup providers offer enterprise-grade security with safeguards like 256-bit data encryption, multi-factor authentication, network firewalls, and 24/7 network monitoring.  

Cost Optimization

Deploying an on-premise backup solution involves both capital and operational expenses. Firstly, you need to purchase and deploy backup servers and additional equipment, including cooling and cabling. Secondly, businesses must hire additional IT professionals and deploy tools to facilitate data backup. 

Endpoint backup services eliminate capital expenses as backup is taken on the provider’s cloud servers. You only need to pay the provider a subscription fee, which includes all IT-related tasks. 

Reduced IT Hassles

When taking backup in-house, the IT team has to take care of backup-related IT tasks, such as monitoring, maintenance, and management, putting an extra burden on them. The endpoint backup provider accomplishes all these tasks and frees time for the IT team, which they can spend on core operations.  

Compliance Assurance

Depending on the industry or demographic, you must comply with multiple data regulations. All the regulations issue strict directives related to the processing and storage of client data, and non-compliance can lead to heavy penalties. 

Managed endpoint backup providers ensure compliance with all major industry regulations, such as GDPR, HIPAA, and PCI DSS. Their compliance team tracks all the regulatory changes and acts accordingly. 

Round-the-clock Support

Data backup and recovery issues can occur at any time. The endpoint backup provider offers 24/7 customer support to resolve any queries that may arise. Their team has expertise in niche backup issues, which ensures quick resolution. 

Conclusion

Endpoint backup is a critical process for securing your remote workforce. It helps mitigate the effects of major cyber threats, like ransomware and phishing. It also ensures business continuity and maintains your client’s trust. However, deploying endpoint backup systems in-house can be budget-heavy. A better solution is to outsource endpoint backup to a managed service provider. 

Ace Cloud Hosting offers cloud-based endpoint backup services on a subscription basis. Choose from our diverse pricing plans and get automated backups, enterprise-grade data security, and 24/7/365 human support. Book a Consultation today!