Time and time again, I am confronted with the harsh realities of personal security in today’s tech-savvy world. In many ways I feel like we’ve lost some ground on how we manage our private data, and I would like to discuss here some of the observations and conclusions that I’ve discovered in my search for “the perfect system” (so to speak). There are a few different methods of storage popularly accepted in the tech world, and I’d like to go over the pros and cons of those before delving into my extrapolation of the deeper factors at work.
- Tangible Storage (my own term) is defined as a storage volume(s) that is physically connected to a device that handles information in a closed loop system with that media. Examples include external USB/FireWire/Thunderbolt backup hard drives, USB Flash storage, CDs/DVDs, etc.
- Referenced Storage (in this case) would be defined as storage that is still maintained in a closed loop system within the larger range of LAN (Local Area Network) or WAN (Wide Area Network) behind a router that masks internal device identifiers. Examples of these devices or setups include NAS Drives (Network Attached Storage), Servers, WiFi-enabled drives, Shared Directories (on local machines, e.g. your Mac’s Public folder or a publicly accessible drive partition).
- Cloud/Net storage – Most commonly associated in reference to services such as Dropbox, iCloud, Amazon Cloud Drive, Google Drive, Mozy, etc. Also referring to farm-based servers, web-based data transfer protocols, email caching, social media websites, etc.
So, after that long-winded introduction, here’s the deal: We are all becoming more trusting of corporations and privacy policies over time, sacrificing security for ease-of-use. It’s a question of priorities for many – and I don’t mean to single out any individual or lifestyle. If you have a secure and efficient system for organizing and protecting your digital life, then by all means disregard what might seem to be my paranoid observations. If you are interested in learning more about how to stay ahead of the game, this is for you. I am calling out to both lightweight users and professionals – your personal data might not seem that important, until you lose it (or worse, it’s stolen). As a concerned and sympathetic fellow technophile, I would like to help dismantle the jumble of services and solutions that are available, and dispel some commonly held misconseptions.
The bottom line is that unless you are in physical possession of your data, or you use proper and airtight current-generation file-level encryption, your sensitive files may very well be at risk. Even with those precautions, and barring physical storage failure (also insanely common and to be expected from any media regardless of statistics or ratings), you may still run into problems. So what (or who) is to be trusted? Where can you turn when your data is priceless and you want to ensure it’s healthy life?
The real answer is similar to one you’d get about other aspects of your life – never put all your eggs in one basket, and under NO circumstances should you assume that you have eliminated all points of failure. I would recommend using mirrored, NAS storage for local backups and storage, with the caveat of using a separate LAN to manage that data service. Direct local backups are great too, and you can feel free to make as many of those as you like, but prudence suggests that we should never assume that any one drive will be reliable. Depending on a user’s needs, one may decide to give up some security (file-level encryption, for instance) in order to boost access speeds or ease-of-use. However, I caution those who would say “I don’t have anything to hide”, because that’s never completely true, and even if it was, it’s still a matter of respect for one’s own privacy. Sites like Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, and even Google are breeding grounds for identity theft and other security threats. It’s the same story with services such as Dropbox or Copy.com. Privacy policies aside, when you put your personal data on storage media that is not local to you, you have given up control of that data. Many companies do offer storage in encrypted formats, but most of these encryption levels and protocols are sub-par and often not up-to-date.
With a growing population of more and more technically adept individuals, it is becoming increasingly common for any given user to have experienced data loss, theft, or misuse related to poor security and storage practices. I urge the reader to consider how they interact with their information and who they entrust it to, as well as how secure and redundant their backup solution is. Keeping these factors in mind can be the difference between a simplistic, efficient, and secure solution and one that is fragmented and prone to theft or loss.