Benefits of Using Onsite Storage as Your Private Cloud

With the advent of cloud computing and storage, many businesses are utilizing cloud services to offset their data storage and backup needs. For most businesses, cloud storage often comes in two flavors: public cloud—cloud services offered by third-party providers over the public Internet, with various pricing structures based on data storage or bandwidth, and private cloud—cloud storage created from servers and other devices that reside solely within an organization.

While public cloud can offer less overhead cost in equipment maintenance, control of the infrastructure falls under the cloud service provider’s responsibility, and its well-known security issues are a common concern. This is why for many enterprises, a private cloud comprised of modern network attached storage (NAS) devices (such as the (such as the Buffalo TeraStation solutions) can be a much more appropriate choice.

Benefits of Private Cloud

The benefits of private cloud are particularly valuable for SMB organizations with small-scale requirements and businesses in regulated industries who need strengthened security to address emerging cyberthreats and flexibility to handle expansion and scalability.

1. Increased Security

No matter how secure the public cloud service is, the fact remains that your data is under management by another provider, with the security protocols removed from your control. In other words, your data is only as secure as the third-party provider makes it to be.

For any company, securing highly-sensitive customer data should be their number one priority. While cloud security has improved over recent years, your data still remains online, and thus at risk of being exposed to various cyberthreats. Private cloud storage provides opportunities to keep your data safe from cyberthreats such as ransomware, and can deliver a higher level of security and privacy though company security protocols such as firewalls to ensure sensitive data cannot be accessed by third-party users and cyberthreats.

And with private cloud, all on-site servers are managed by internal IT staff, which not only helps ease worries of having to rely upon another party's security framework, but also provides an important aspect of data security: redundancy. Having multiple NAS devices on-site for your private cloud builds redundancy into your data network environment, so you don’t have to worry about lost business while a server is down or inaccessible. You have complete control over how the data is stored, who has access, and information security protocols.

2. Cost Savings

While public cloud tends to tout lower capacity costs, in truth they are often more expensive, as public cloud service providers often saddle you with hidden fees. Often, public cloud can suddenly demand unforeseen costs, such as if you encounter a sudden demand spike and need to accommodate for extra bandwidth. Hidden and sudden costs are often hard to budget for, which can lead to operational trouble. When utilizing cloud services, like entering any contract where you pay for an ongoing service, costs can be unpredictable, especially if you have no control over possible price and term changes.

On the other hand, private cloud will not only help you save on capacity costs, but can also save you hardware costs, as virtualization allows you to optimize your storage to be allocated as you see fit, and expansion can be much easier to plan for as iSCSI can allow you to only acquire the capacity you need, without needing to deal with price tiering issues of public cloud.

3. Increased Flexibility and Efficiency

With public cloud storage, you will always be at the mercy of your Internet Service Provider. Bandwidth will always be a concern when it comes to accessing data, and when dealing with higher data volumes and service hours, it is very possible that you will run into bottlenecks, severely affecting your operations.

On the other hand, your own private cloud storage will typically offer much faster data access and low latency as you will not have to rely on the uptime and connectivity of an external network. You can enable not only faster data access but also smoother backups as well, improving efficiency. As mentioned, with virtualization you can allocate resources as you see fit.

4. Industry Compliance

For some enterprises, new regulations have been introduced to integrate with advancing data storage technology, such as HIPAA and HI-TECH for the healthcare industry. With the rise of user data privacy concerns, there are also regional laws, such as the GDPR laws from the European Union. The strict industry regulations often restrict or forbid the use of public cloud to store certain types of data, especially private user data such as customer or employee data. This means that sometimes, a private cloud is the only real viable data storage solution in order to meet with industry compliance as some public cloud service providers cannot meet the requirements.

Buffalo’s Secure Private Cloud Solutions

If you are only using public cloud services to store and back up your data, switching to a private cloud can possibly reduce your costs while increasing productivity and security for your data. The TeraStation 3020 is a secure private cloud NAS built for SMB in mind to provide cost-effective storage and backup solutions while establishing a private cloud. And if you would like to continue using your cloud services, you can integrate them into the TS3020 to establish a hybrid cloud to enjoy even more flexibility and security for your business.

In addition to flexible and proven product offerings, Buffalo’s expert technicians are on hand 24/7 in North America to help advise you on the right hybrid cloud backup strategy. With nuanced security features such as drive encryption and a closed system, as well as an adaptable array of backup features, Buffalo prides itself in providing flexible data storage solutions that offer the security, stability, and simplicity you need so you can manage your data with peace of mind. Responsible for many industry firsts and technology standards, Buffalo has four decades of networking and computer peripheral manufacturing and design experience.