More than half of consumers state that their personal data is more valuable than the devices that store their data.
BURLINGTON, MA. - March 30, 2015 - Today, Acronis®, the global leader in new generation data protection, announced the results of a survey conducted among 350+ consumers, revealing how they value and protect the information located on their devices.
In time for World Backup Day, the survey findings, which are also highlighted in an infographic, demonstrate the importance of backup and digital responsibility in an environment where every part of consumers' lives is now taking a digital form, including financial and health documents, photos, work files, and more.
According to the research, over 75 percent of consumers store their data digitally and more than 50 percent state that their personal data are more valuable than their actual devices - solidifying that consumers know they need to preserve their data. In fact, the survey results show that consumers would be nearly three times more upset if they lost their photos than if they lost their phone, computer or tablet.
Although they treasure their digital information, the survey reveals that consumers are putting little effort into ensuring their data is safe. Less than half of the respondents do not save their data on an external device or in the cloud. This means that more than 50 percent of consumers store their data only on their computer - or not at all. Of those using a data backup system, only one third are protecting their entire computer system, the rest are simply protecting some files.
Nearly half of the respondents value their data at over $1,000, proving that they certainly hold their information to a high standard. While only five percent of consumers surveyed are willing to actually spend that amount to recover their data once it is lost, an overwhelming 94 percent of respondents expressed that they are willing to spend up to $100 dollars to preventively backup their data.
"The majority of consumers do not realize the importance of backing up their digital memories, including everything from precious photos to financial information, until a catastrophe occurs," said Serg Bell, CEO, Acronis. "What consumers should understand is that there are easy and inexpensive ways to safeguard the digital data that they're most afraid of losing."
World Backup Day serves to educate and motivate the public on the importance of taking action to protect their most precious information stored digitally. As the survey indicates, consumers place high value on their personal data, but aren't yet taking the proper steps to ensure that their information is secure.
Methodology
The survey was conducted by Acronis in February 2015 through a Google Consumer Survey and consisted of 366 respondents in the USA.
About Acronis:
Acronis is a global cyber protection company that provides natively integrated cybersecurity, data protection, and endpoint management for managed service providers (MSPs), small and medium businesses (SMBs), and enterprise IT departments. Acronis solutions are highly efficient and designed to identify, prevent, detect, respond, remediate, and recover from modern cyberthreats with minimal downtime, ensuring data integrity and business continuity. Acronis offers the most comprehensive security solution on the market for MSPs with its unique ability to meet the needs of diverse and distributed IT environments.
A Swiss company founded in Singapore in 2003, Acronis has 15 offices worldwide and employees in 50+ countries. Acronis Cyber Protect is available in 26 languages in 150 countries and is used by over 20,000 service providers to protect over 750,000 businesses. Learn more at www.acronis.com.