Off-Site "3-2-1" Backup - Potential Business/Proof Of Concept Idea - Need Input 😉

[Operation_PeaSea_Storm]

My Potential Extremely ROUGH Idea:

 

So in a brief nutshell, I have been throwing around an idea I have had for a while now.

 

My idea would be to provide a secure off-site location for people to store there encrypted, password protected off-site drives. I would provide people with the software required to encrypt and password protect either there own drive or I would also offer to provide a drive and the required software to encrypt and password protect there data.

 

All off-site backups would like inside a secure fire proof safe and I would provide a few different teirs for them to choose from.

 

Eventually I would also provide a service that would allow users to have there own dedicated computer that would integrate with a service such as Dropbox, and this would allow the user to backup there Dropbox data automatically to there dedicated server. So this would allow the user the user to backup there data simply and easily "on the fly" so to speak.

 

As I stated above, this would be a VERY small business in the beginning and I currently have NO business plan etc. As I am literally just "airing" my thoughts so to speak. To say this idea is in its infancy is an understatement. I have done no due diligence etc. Or much research to be honest at this point.

 

With that all said, I guess I was just looking for any and all constructive criticism, feedback, comments or suggestions etc.

 

Please be nice  

 

Thanks so very much in advance  

 

P.S. - I AM NOT TOO SURE IF I HAVE POSTED THIS IN THE CORRECT CATEGORY, SO IF I HAVEN'T, I AM VERY VERY SORRY, AND IF A MOD WOULD LIKE TO MOVE IT TO THE CORRECT PLACE, I WOULD GREATLY APPRECIATE IT - Thanks so much again  

[mistermodcreator]

Well, my input on this would be to not use one drive per customer, since over a long time in a safe, the data will corrupt. Of course, putting drives in a safe is not a ideal solution, but if you do it, at least use some kind of data redundancy (like RAID or ZFS, minimum 2 drive redundancy, as in 2 drives can fail before you loose data). You would also need to periodically power the drives on and check the data on them in order to rebuilt potentially corrupted data. The last thing you want is a lot of angry customers asking you to give them their data, when you can't.

 

To do that, you should (at least in my opinion) use some kind of server right from the beginning. This would make checking the data periodically much easier, even giving you the ability to automate that. Maybe, giving each customer their own array isn't a good idea either, you may consider encrypting the data to files you can store on one large array. Also remind your customers to store their password (used for encryption) in multiple locations, since forgetting that would be equal to a data loss.

 

You may also consider adding some contract or semilar that states your customers can't blame you in case of a data loss, since I imagine that could bring your buissiness down quite quickly.

I'm no expert on either on these topics, but still hope there were some valid points in there.

[Electronics Wizardy]

So why would a customer buy this instead of using a cloud providers storage? Datacenters are generally pretty safe and secure so fire/threft is a low ish risk. And worst case the data is store in other datacenters too.

 

Lots of storafe already exists to backup stuff like m365 and Dropbox to s3 compatible storage, with encryption.

 

 

[LIGISTX]

4 hours ago, Operation_PeaSea_Storm said:

My Potential Extremely ROUGH Idea:

 

So in a brief nutshell, I have been throwing around an idea I have had for a while now.

 

My idea would be to provide a secure off-site location for people to store there encrypted, password protected off-site drives. I would provide people with the software required to encrypt and password protect either there own drive or I would also offer to provide a drive and the required software to encrypt and password protect there data.

 

All off-site backups would like inside a secure fire proof safe and I would provide a few different teirs for them to choose from.

 

Eventually I would also provide a service that would allow users to have there own dedicated computer that would integrate with a service such as Dropbox, and this would allow the user to backup there Dropbox data automatically to there dedicated server. So this would allow the user the user to backup there data simply and easily "on the fly" so to speak.

 

As I stated above, this would be a VERY small business in the beginning and I currently have NO business plan etc. As I am literally just "airing" my thoughts so to speak. To say this idea is in its infancy is an understatement. I have done no due diligence etc. Or much research to be honest at this point.

 

With that all said, I guess I was just looking for any and all constructive criticism, feedback, comments or suggestions etc.

 

Please be nice  

 

Thanks so very much in advance  

 

P.S. - I AM NOT TOO SURE IF I HAVE POSTED THIS IN THE CORRECT CATEGORY, SO IF I HAVEN'T, I AM VERY VERY SORRY, AND IF A MOD WOULD LIKE TO MOVE IT TO THE CORRECT PLACE, I WOULD GREATLY APPRECIATE IT - Thanks so much again  

I’d trust backblaze way before I’d trust you, both from a security standpoint and data integrity/resiliency standpoint, no offense.

 

You'd want to run a ZFS array, and then you’d need to develop some front end for users to authenticate through and upload their data through… this won’t be trivial. 
 

Im not saying don’t pursue it if it’s something you want to do, but you need to take cyber security extremely seriously, need to have proper network segmentation, proper high availability, and proper authentication also users can’t see each others data.