Data protection is an essential part of every IT strategy. A good data protection plan minimizes the risk of downtime and data loss as well as the risk of a compliance incident. Most enterprise level data protection implementations are complex, costly and require thoughtful planning to ensure that the risk of data loss is reduced to an acceptable level. As with any technology there is no shortage of catch phrases to distract the overburdened administrator as well as the budget conscious executive. Phrases like “Integrated Data Protection”, “Industry Leading”, “End to End” and yes, even “cloud”. Let’s face it. The only reason you spend a dime on this stuff is to reduce risk because risk adds cost to your operation. The cost of data re-entry, the cost of down time or the cost of compliance fines. How simple or complex the system that you create to deal with risk is not the issue. The issue is whether the cost of the system is less than the risk of doing nothing.