Backup your online life
Whether or not we have a complete backup plan in place, I’m sure everyone agrees that regularly backing up our important files is a good idea. But what about that online identity many of us have worked so hard to create? If you’re like most people, you rely solely on someone else to keep all your information safe. If one of these companies were to suddenly go out of business or lose your information, would you be able to recover it? What if your account is hacked and you lose access to it? Will you be able to get your information back?
Time to “Backupify”
There are many options out there to back up your individual online accounts but Backupify aims cover all your needs with a single hosted solution for the most popular services (Gmail, Facebook, Flickr, etc.). And, until January 31st, they’re offering free accounts (I couldn’t find current pricing on their site but others have mentioned their plans ranged from $3.95 to $14.95 per month before this offer).
What are you waiting for?
This all sounds great but what about the security implications of giving all my account information to one company? Not only do I need to trust this company with all my data, but, now that I’ve consolidated all this information into one account, I need to make certain I don’t let this account get into the wrong hands.
All things considered, I decided it wouldn’t hurt to go ahead and set up an account at Backupify while it’s free. I plan to wait until the company has been around longer before thinking about giving it access to more sensitive data such as my Gmail account but for now it’s a great spot to back up all my Flickr pictures.
On a related note, if you want to free yourself completely from the hassle of maintaining your online identity, you can always commit online social suicide to get rid of these account in one fell swoop (just be sure you’ve Backupified first!).
