If you’re a business owner or someone who uses the Internet regularly (and who doesn’t?) you have heard people talk about “the cloud.” What is the cloud? Do you know if you’re using it? Are you using it correctly? More importantly, is your data safe in the cloud?
We have the answers about the cloud and will be covering it in a series of articles you need to have in your IT and personal arsenal.
The cloud is:
- The way we store personal data
- The way we store business data
- The way we access entertainment
- A place that hackers can access if you haven’t secured your storage (more on that later)
What Is ‘The Cloud’? 19 Tips
IT professionals toss around the phrase, “the cloud,” sometimes without giving any explanation as to what it is, how it works and what it provides business owners and personal computer users.
Cloud storage – at its most basic – is a way to store data, email, photos, share information and stream movies – in a way that doesn’t use your computer’s internal storage. More importantly is that if you give someone access to this storage, you can share data. This is a double-edged sword though – depending on whom you share the cloud access with, you may be opening up your data to hackers.
As a business owner, the cloud is:
- A way to consolidate mission-critical content
- A digital resource
- A way to make data always-available to workers
- Clients and remote workers can access data on the cloud (important for those businesses impacted by coronavirus and with pivoting to work-from-home staffers.
Consumers use the cloud to:

- Access email such as Gmail accounts
- Dropboxes where information and photos might be shared
- Viewing content through streaming services like Netflix
- Listening to music through Spotify, for example
The term, the cloud, has a vast definition and it takes into effect almost everything we do online on a daily basis.
Here are some of the many benefits of the cloud:
- Security
- Disaster assistance
- Pay as you go services
- Off-site data storage (critical to business continuity)
- It provides a lower cost of ownership because you’re utilizing a third-party platform
- You, or anyone whom you give access, can get to the information from anywhere, on any device
- It is easy to upgrade and update (be sure you’re running any and all updates your cloud service provider releases)
Some of the largest and most well-known cloud storage providers include: Amazon Web Services and Google.
If your business is like most it is using this storage system for many of its apps, data access and more. Are you using it safely? Have your employees been trained on the safest ways to access data and protect it from hackers and cyberattacks?
If you’re unclear on the answers to these questions, DM us or schedule an appointment to talk with our President Seth Melendez. Protect your company’s most valuable asset – its data.
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