Losing data can be at best an inconvenience and at worst absolutely disastrous. The ability to recover lost data is best started before anything happens in the first place and to back up essential data and other files regularly. Having a bootable backup of the system files is one way to recover but these are sometime less than reliable and data can still be lost when a system crashes or is infected with a virus, Trojan or worm. Scheduling a regular back at a convenient time is worthwhile, if the Macintosh is left on (best not connected to the internet unless a secure WPS is in place) then the best time is late in the evening when user activity will be low and the system can use valuable resources to do a thorough back up. But what happens when the OS back up system fails to restore or repair damage caused by malicious software? The answer is sometimes to try a data recovery service.
Data recovery services are there for one thing only, to get at data that has been corrupted, lost or even damaged. The ability of data recovery is no stranger to many Apple users and companies offer many services that can recover data from a variety of storage devices. Accidental deletion is the most often cited reason for using data recovery services and this is a relatively straightforward process. The best way to avoid accidental deletion is to always have a back up. Many people use USB sticks and these are great ways to transport files from the office to home securely, especially if they hold sensitive data that cannot be electronically sent. Saving this data on a hard drive is one way to secure that data is not lost from the USB stick but what happens to the hard drive if the office PC is damaged by fire, flood or worse, an electronic attack? Again, this is where the services of a data recovery agency can be used.
What happens when data is recovered? Data is never `lost`. The directory or index that the drive uses to identify the location is removed which means that the data is still present but the computer will assume, as there is no index, that the data is useless and can be overwritten. Providing data has not been overwritten and can be accessed by a technician this will then determine the level and quality of data that can be recovered. Usually data recovery services will asses the level of quality and quote based on what is recoverable.
With this in mind the best practice to back up data is almost certainly to save data on a remote hard drive (some users now pay for remote storage) and this back up process needs to be set up as a regular occurrence and if all can not be backed up and is lost then use a company that specialises in data recovery, has one of the highest rates of data corruption of data and in the city, the access to wi-fi puts the security of business users at more risk from data hackers, so a good protection system is essential as well as a good back up protocol.
