MSPs and Data Archives: Staying in Compliance with Regulations
Managed services providers (MSPs) that have customers in vertical industries with compliance regulations need to be careful about how they archive data for those customers.
As the expert, an MSP needs to be aware of compliance regulations in various industries, a requirement that may seem overwhelming at first, but we've found a few ways to ease the stress.
To assist with this daunting task, data backup and disaster recovery (BDR) and business continuity (BC) solutions Datto formulated a short checklist on one of its blog posts. Check out the following advice:
Stay on top of your research
- Stay on top of the various compliance requirements that vary from industry to industry. Remember: There are different regulations for different verticals.
- Be aware of customer compliance requirements and take the necessary steps to meet these regulations.
Set a realistic budget
- As with anything else, collecting data indefinitely has an associated cost. Pay attention to the total amount of protected data a server has along with the expected amount of time to retain this data.
- Observe how much local data change there is over the next few months. Forecast how much space will be needed for the client’s specified retention. Provide various options to the client and devise the most cost effective route.
Spend time training
- Take the time to properly train the individual repsonsible for compliance in the business. This initial training period will save you time in the long run, since you will not have to be engaged every time an audit is required.
Taking on archiving can be challenging at first for any MSP, but the above checklist should make life a tad bit easier — or at least we hope.
