How safe is your data? That is the question Radix Technologies is asking in a new campaign to highlight data security for SMBs and start up businesses. Most SMB owners are aware of the dangers that hackers pose, as well as more mundane threats to data like power cuts, or other equipment failure, and most, when asked would be pretty confident that they have sufficient protection in place, but have they really?

Radix CTO David Corriveau explains: ‘For many SMBs and start ups, hiring quality IT staff is difficult. The best are attracted to high salaries and a higher profile at larger companies, so those that are left are often transient, and eager to prove themselves, while not necessary being that competent. However, the pressure of running a business start up means that firms make do, and trust their data security to IT personnel who might not necessarily know what they are doing.’

So, aside from blind trust, or living with the suspense of not knowing if yours and your customers’ data is safe, what can be done? One answer that is increasingly on everyone’s mind is cloud computing and Software as a Service.

Software as a Service is a model by which businesses subscribe to a particular application, which is provided over the internet. The model is analogous with the way most pay for gas and electricity: put simply, you pay for what you use. This has considerable cost saving implications, as organisations no longer need to purchase expensive software licenses along with the hardware to run it. All you need it a browser and an internet connection, and any fluctuations in demand can be handled a simply a flicking on a light.

Free webmail services like Hotmail and Gmail are perhaps the best known services that make use of the model, and they have been around for a long time, but it is really only in the last two or three years that the notion of businesses running their mission critical applications over the web has become popular and viable. Companies such as Google and Amazon provide subscription services for applications such as office software, payment processing and data storage.

But is it safe to entrust all of your data to a third party? And what if that third party goes bust, or there is a catastrophic loss of service? Move One Director, Curt Clements, thinks that the answer is a simple case of odds: ‘I read bloggers and columnists everyday saying that businesses should think twice about entrusting their data to a third party, but business owners need to ask themselves what is more likely: Amazon or Google going bust or some catastrophe befalling their own onsite equipment. I’ve heard stories of servers being irreparably damaged when a roof leaks over a holiday weekend, and the supposedly rock solid backup contingency failing. Its unfortunate that it often takes this kind of event to make a business rethink its strategy.’

Radix Technologies has developed via a suite of Software as a Service applications aimed at relocation service providers, global HR mobility practitioners and logistics and supply chain managers. Making use of the most up-to-date cloud technology, via has been developed in consultation with a number of industry professionals to create a feature set that allows seamless and efficient collaboration and productivity.

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Tags | backup, CRM Systems, customer relationship management system, data, data security, Expat, hr, HR Tracking, medical, medical records, radix, records, Relo Tracking, Saas, Software as a Service