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Receiving a quote from an address like "companyname@gmail.com" or "info@yourcompany.es" does not convey the same thing. Email with your own domain is one of the simplest improvements to a business's image, and it also brings practical advantages in security, organisation and control that many SMEs in Benalmádena, Marbella and the Costa del Sol still miss out on.

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A hard drive that will not boot, a USB stick the computer no longer recognises or a memory card that asks to be "formatted" are among the most stressful faults, because what is at stake is not the device but the documents, photos or company accounts. The good news is that in many cases the data can be recovered. The bad news is that the first minutes after the failure are decisive and one wrong step can lose it forever.

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Many small businesses in Benalmádena, Marbella and the rest of the Costa del Sol think cyberattacks are something that happens to big companies. The reality is the opposite: SMEs are the favourite target because they usually have less protection and a single slip is enough to paralyse the office for days. At Master Informática we have been supporting local businesses for more than 20 years, and these are the risks we see most and how to prevent them without making your life complicated.

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Losing a company's data (invoices, accounts, projects, emails or the client database) can paralyse the business for days. And it does not take a major disaster: a failing drive, a stolen laptop or an email with an infected file is enough. That is why backups are the most important protection measure for any SME or self-employed worker.

In this guide we explain, without jargon, how to protect your company's data and how to prepare for ransomware, one of the most common attacks today.

What is ransomware and why does it affect SMEs?

Ransomware is a type of virus that encrypts the files on the computer and the network and demands a ransom to recover them. It usually gets in through an email with a misleading attachment or link, a program downloaded from an untrustworthy website or by exploiting an un-updated computer.

Small businesses are a frequent target because they usually have fewer security measures than large ones. Paying the ransom does not guarantee recovering the data, so the best defence is having backups the attack cannot reach.

The 3-2-1 backup rule

It is the most widespread recommendation and the easiest to apply:

• 3 copies of important data: the original and two copies.
• 2 different media, for example an external drive or NAS and the cloud.
• 1 copy outside the office, so that a theft, fire or flood does not take everything at once.

To protect yourself from ransomware, at least one copy should also be disconnected or immutable, meaning it cannot be modified or deleted from the office computers.

What data to back up

• Working documents, shared folders and servers.
• Accounting, invoicing and management software (and their databases).
• Email, especially if it is stored only on the computer.
• The company website, if you have one.
• Important settings: passwords in a secure manager, licences, etc.

How often to back up

It depends on how much work you can afford to lose. For most businesses, a sensible approach is an automatic daily backup of working data and full weekly backups. What matters is that it is automatic: backups that depend on someone remembering to do them end up failing.

The most common mistake: not checking that backups work

Many businesses discover their backups were useless just when they need them: the drive was full, the task stopped months ago or important folders were missing. That is why you need to check regularly that backups are being made and do test restores from time to time.

Other measures to protect yourself from ransomware

1. Keep your operating system, software and antivirus up to date.
2. Use antivirus with specific ransomware protection.
3. Enable two-step verification on email and cloud services.
4. Train your team to recognise suspicious emails.
5. Limit permissions: not every user needs access to every folder.

We help you protect your company's data

At Master Informática we set up and monitor backups for businesses in Benalmádena, Marbella and the Costa del Sol, and include them in our IT maintenance for businesses. If you have already suffered a fault or data loss, we also offer computer repair and data recovery.

Call us on 629 555 302, message us on WhatsApp or use the contact form and we will check the state of your backups for free.

Backups are only one part of protection. To review the rest, see our practical cybersecurity guide for SMEs.

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Most IT faults that paralyse an office could have been avoided. A drive that had been warning for weeks, a backup that stopped running without anyone noticing or an un-updated computer that opens the door to a virus. Preventive IT maintenance is all about getting ahead of those problems.

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