It’s Friday evening, you’ve shut up the office and you’re all done for the weekend. Time to head home.

As you’re eating your pasta, the phone rings. And it’s the call no business owner wants to get.

When you arrive back at the office, firefighters are hosing down the last of the flames and you’re dialing your insurers. It’s not a disaster, but your server room is toast.

A few days of clean-up, some new kit and air freshener and all will be shipshape again, ready to restore everything from your backup.

You are all backed up… Right?

Fire, theft, accidental file deletion or disgruntled employees… there are lots of reasons why you might need to rely on your backup system.

But the most likely reason by far is that your business becomes the victim of a cyber crime.

There are countless forms of criminal attack, many of them designed to steal your data and either encrypt it or deny you access to it until you pay a ransom.

This kind of crime doesn’t have to trigger a full scale disaster, but it’s a fact that most small businesses that are hit with a full-on cyber attack don’t recover from it.

For all these reasons, backing up your data is one of the strongest precautions you can take. Set it up properly and make it part of your routine to check that it’s working. Because one day your backup could save your business.

Here’s what you need to know.