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Backups
Empower takes backups very very seriously with two separate procedures.
- For software source code (not your data - see below) each time a new version is deployed (this can be several times each day) copies of that version are saved to multiple machines in our offices.
Together with copies held on test machines we have copies dating back to 2013.
A further copy is placed in a folder that is copied (on a weekly basis) to one of several external hard drives that are held securely off site.
In addition periodically we upload a copy to secure backup folders in the cloud.
In the event where we lost access to our office machines (e.g. theft or fire or other event) at most we would lose a week of our work (not your data see below).
We also have backup machinery ready to go at a secure off site location with all our tools loaded on it so we would be able to support our Customers at short notice, even if we were to lose access to our offices.
- The Empower databases are stored and backed up differently from software source code.
Live versions of our databases are stored in secure Amazon Web Services (AWS) data centers in Sydney Australia. For information on AWS data centers and security click here.
Empower uses AWS's managed implementation of Microsoft's SQL Server database. This allows us to (given a database or server crash) roll back to a live backup to within a few minutes of the crash.
However the AWS managed implementation has proven to be extremely reliable.
Since going live with the cloud based system in 2013, we have never had a database or database server crash and have never lost any data due to system failure.
Nevertheless every night (Australian time) our databases (including the database that contains your data) are automatically backed up.
Three copies of each of these backups are securely stored at multiple AWS data centers in Australia. These are kept for six days.
In addition, on a daily basis, a backup of the database containing your data is automatically copied to a further AWS data center in North America which also is stored in three places in multiple data centers.
And weekly a copy of the database backups are copied to an AWS data center in Europe - again it is stored in three places in multiple data centers.
And finally at the end of each month a copy of the latest data is saved to another data center in Europe - again it is stored in 3 places in multiple data centers - we have backups of these going back more than 18 months.
Finally when we are making structural changes to a database (this is relatively rare - usually only once or twice a month) we take backups of the appropriate database before and after making any changes. These are usually kept in an AWS Australian data center for a day or so after we are confident that they will not be required.
See also
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