Building a sensible backup and recovery strategy should be a top priority for organizations in today’s challenging security landscape. At the same time, they face significantly higher data storage costs – and even costly overage fees.
Many organizations admit that they’re unsure of exactly where their cloud costs are going, so leaders should keep a close eye on data environments to avoid sprawl and risk of breach. Here are three ways your organization can mitigate data volume and costs by proactively applying more robust data governance and information lifecycle principles.
1. Declutter your data environment
As the cost of storing cloud data continues to skyrocket, it’s crucial to take concrete steps toward shrinking your organization’s data footprint and removing idle data that could be incurring unnecessary costs.
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For example, collaboration workspaces associated with short-term projects and initiatives – and the content contained within – may remain in your organization’s cloud environment long after these projects have wrapped. Make it a habit to regularly declutter your data environment and routinely remove any redundant, obsolete, and trivial information.
2. Fortify lifecycle management practices
As the adoption of collaboration tools increases, IT teams must ensure that these workspaces include proper security and governance. Without these policies, workspaces can multiply, leading to data sprawl and increased storage costs. Excess workspaces can create clutter and confusion, making it difficult for users to navigate your cloud environment and locate the information they need.
To ensure the integrity of your collaboration workspaces, consider giving only authorized users the ability to create workspaces to avoid redundancy. With collaboration tools, take a measured approach to the native self-service capabilities that enable users to create new collaboration spaces.
While users should be able to get the tools they need to be productive, “managed” self-service processes with guidance and appropriate controls can improve the employee experience and avoid clogging up your network with unessential data.
Additionally, policies that prompt data owners to routinely assess the relevance – and even archive workspace data when appropriate – help safeguard sensitive information and keep it well-organized and secure.
3. Consider cloud backup tools
Retaining data from inactive or expired employee accounts can take up a surprising amount of cloud storage. When an employee leaves your organization, it’s essential to properly back up all their emails, files, and recordings to not only streamline data management but reduce the risk of breach down the line.
IT needs to put the right tools in place to back up and store this data while giving administrators the ability to easily locate, restore, and send information directly to a current employee when needed. Cloud backup tools can help streamline how this data is archived and managed while avoiding the cost of one-time retrieval fees or having to pay a ransom in the case of a data breach.
In the midst of growing storage costs and evolving cyber threats, organizations must maintain a vigilant approach to managing data environments. To avoid snowballing cloud costs and protect sensitive data, adopting stricter governance and lifecycle management practices will be key in 2023 and beyond.
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