How to Backup Your Smart Phone

Lucas123 writes "According to a Computerworld story there will be 8 million cell phones/smart phones lost this year. The site describes how to easily back up data on handhelds. The piece also addresses the future of these technologies: 'In Dulaney's opinion, traditional USB syncing "will die." Gartner is telling its corporate customers they should hasten this process by not permitting their employees to sync to their PCs. He explains this by saying that individual end users can create distributed computing and security problems because they are poor data administrators. Moreover, he adds, PCs are not necessarily more reliable than cell phones. Drake gives a qualified endorsement of wireless e-mail as the master application for backing up and syncing data, saying the technology is fine for dedicated e-mail environments but insufficient for corporate environments that require a vast array of wireless applications.'"

Comments

yeah thats just want i want

[OutOnARock]

all my contacts and sensitive data in the hands of my cell service provider.

"Oh you want to leave, I'm sorry but our backups failed and your data is gone..."

"Oh you decided to stay, guess what, we've found that backup...."

No longer an issue

[Realistic_Dragon]

My data account with t-mobile in the UK costs less than $30 per month and covers 3gb of data*. 10gb would be less than $50 per month. Speeds are over 100k/sec. Do the first sync by popping the SD card into your laptop, install rsync, set up a scheduled task to run while the thing is on the charger at night and then forget about it.

If you are at home it can even discover and use WiFi saving you some bandwidth - if you think it's worth the hassle.

Of course you might have problems with this if your smart phone doesn't run Linux, but it'll only cost you about $300 to fix that :)

*More is not charged for, but you can't do it too often.

Re:No longer an issue

[trolltalk.com]

So you want to sync a 1 or 2-gig phone card? 2 gigabytes = 16 gigabits. That's a LOT of $$$.

I'll stick to my USB cable - fast, easy to use under linux - no special drivers needed.

Could someone restore the article?

[Neil Blender]

From a backup?

Blame the users

[jrumney]

He explains this by saying that individual end users can create distributed computing and security problems because they are poor data administrators.

The biggest reason that corporate IT departments aren't particularly respected by the rest of the company is this blame the user culture that seems to pervade it. If there are shortcomings in the desktop and mobile software that makes it easy to get things wrong, then the software is at fault. Software is a tool for people, not the other way around.

Re:Blame the users

[The One and Only]

If a company wants to protect data that it has on company-provided smartphones, "trust everyone to back it up to their PC, and back up their PC on a regular basis as well", is not going to work because most people don't back up their PC's. Pointing that out isn't "blame the user", it's "point out how user behavior constrains how IT can solve the problem". Solutions could include backing it up by other means, or it could include automatically backing up work PC's somehow, but if trusting the employees to voluntarily back up their work PC's, ipso facto, does not work, then it's not a reliable system and we shouldn't avoid saying so just to avoid hurting people's feelings.

Re:Blame the users

[KillerCow]

The biggest reason that corporate IT departments aren't particularly respected by the rest of the company is this blame the user culture that seems to pervade it.

Yes, but the biggest reason that corporate IT departments don't respect users is because users ask them to do things that are impossible.

User: "I want a way to buck up my data onto an unsecured machine securely."

IT: "There's no product on the market to do that, or if there is, you wont pay for it."

User: "It's all your fault!"

Re:Blame the users

[JesseL]

What you say is true.

Unfortunately, it's also true that past a certain point it's impossible for software or administrators to completely correct the failings of stupid, lazy, or irresponsible users.

Encouraging users (or anyone) to shoulder a little responsibility isn't always a bad thing.

Re:Blame the users

[iluvcapra]

Pointing that out isn't "blame the user", it's "point out how user behavior constrains how IT can solve the problem".

If the user's home directories are kept on a share, then it's relatively easy to back up their stuff on a daily basis, but it costs money to build the SAN and network infrastructure. Even easier, put scripts on their systems to rsync their home directories to a repository at night; there are several commercial programs that will do this, but again you do have to spend money (on Macs, Retrospect was pretty good for this).

Maybe the Iron Triangle of IT is GoodCheapConstrain the User.

With regard to the article, it's solution is no better, it proposes several carrier-based backup plans that lock all your data up on Sprint's servers-- \sarcastic{which I'm sure are SO much safer than the average corporate desktop, nobody would ever think of cracking a box with a 10 million business names, tel numbers and addresses on it.}

I had to exchange my iPhone yesterday for a new one (the touch screen had become numb in a section after a week, a very painless process BTW). When I brought the new one back from the store, iTunes restored it UTTERLY: when the phone came up, the application I had up before I synced was in focus, all of my applications were in even the same modes they had been in when I synced it, down to the route I had showing in Google Maps, plus my history. My old Treo, though not this detailed, would still have my photos, call logs, and applications all restored, and with the associated preferences and settings restored. I just don't see a cell carrier providing that level of support for individual devices.

Re:Blame the users

[ryanov]

Frankly, I think the bigger concern of most companies is data not being lost, but escaping. Most companies seem to want to find a way to protect documents from getting off the phone and onto a computer that is able to send the data anywhere... at least that's what I've read.

Re:Blame the users

[QuantumRiff]

While I agree with you, there are certainly exceptions.. I work in a place that is regulated by privacy laws. If someone wants to take work home, we have to tell them HELL NO! Because the bottom line of it all is that my Dept. is in charge of many IT things, but along with that comes the responsibility of safeguarding our data. We work very hard to ensure that our data and systems are protected. We do not have the time, inclination, or resources to also guarantee that your home computer that your kids use to play on myspace is also protected. Yes, it is a hassle that we don't allow certain things on our network.. (good luck trying to access our main network from the wireless, which is physically separate from the other networks..) Yes, its an inconvenience for some, but in order to do the greater good (protect the company) we have to...

Just look at the VA stolen laptop last year.. One employee was careless and took things home he shouldn't have, the laptop got stolen, and how much time and money did the VA have to spend fixing that little goof, along with the PR issues.. While many will argue that the laptop should have been secured, and encrypted, and had a big red button that will cause it to self destruct, the simpler, much more cost effective solution for many companies is to say "no."

I think that many of these problems would be solved if the users had better communication with IT.. One of my Pet Peeves is users coming in with a solution, instead of a problem.. IE, "We need X", instead of saying "We would like to something that will enable use to do Y because of Z". Then we can point them to several different ways to accomplish Y that will work within our requirements..

Re:Blame the users

[Penguinisto]

...but it costs money to build the SAN and network infrastructure.

Well, NFS / automount and an array works quite nicely if you don't want to shell out the dough for a full-on SAN. With Linux users it's a total breeze to maintain once you get it set up (especially so w/ NIS or LDAP to bind it all together). Tie the /home server into Samba for the Windows users (then instruct 'em to drop their backups to a mapped drive on their desktop PC), and as long as you can keep the network halfway tuned (and keep an eye on it for bandwidth reasons, just like you would for a SAN), then it's not too much of an expense or headache.

I agree perfectly that the article completely overlooks the abuse potentials (wot!? You're leaving us for XYZ phone company? Well, we're sorry, but your data stays here!)

Crackberries already have facilities to sync email and contact/calendar/etc info wirelessly... wouldn't take much to extrapolate the concept to other non-RIM situations, would it? At least that way the corp keeps control of the original data (like they would w/ all the data passing through their Exchange box, for instance).

/P

soution: bitpim

[Tmack]

BitPim will gladly backup your phone. Its also free, open source, GPL software. Might not support All phones, but its support list is quite long. Works great with my old Sanyo 4900...

Tm

Fun with Vendor Lock-In Techniques

[Adambomb]

Ahh the cellphone industry.

This type of backup is nothing new, a provider here in canada has had this style of application for backing up contact lists for over a year now for certain handsets. The convenience of a contact list (read: the inconvenience of losing it) is one of the retention techniques used in the industry here in canada, and i'm sure it is the same in the states. I somehow doubt that having the contacts stored by the provider themselves is going to be at all useful EXCEPT for one specific case: You lose/destroy/etc your device and are getting a hardware upgrade through your existing provider or purchasing out of pocket FOR the existing provider.

Blaming users own inability to herd data securely is a severely weak excuse for removing the one nearly-universal method of accessing the phone's data. What these companies want is to remove any and all data transfers that are not through their own data networks. Why would you want your customer to back up his own information when you can retain control of said information? Why would you want a customer to find a way to upload mp3's directly to their mp3 enabled phone instead of using their mobile browser store?

The rational for this is obvious, and the only sad thing is that the corporate clients are not the ones who will feel the pain. Once it becomes a "Standard" to not have USB file transfers, its the CONSUMERS who are going to find themselves limited to their provider for any and all data transfers (check data plan rates recently? if you do not REALLY need them they're quite the thorn to the side).

This smells to me like a prelude to DRM type control approached from a different angle. Instead of putting the content control in the content, its in controlling delivery methods.

More reliable than humans?

[Alchemar]

The hardware portion of a PC might not be anymore reliable than a cellphone, but to date I have not complete any of the following acts with my desktop

Had it fallen out of my shirt pocket into a comode
Forgoten to take it out of the pocket in my shorts before going swimming
Had to remove a shorting battery because the desktop was in my pocket when the canoe tipped over
Left my desktop on the table at a restraunt
Left my desktop sitting on the roof of my car while I drove off
Had my desktop fall out of my pocket while getting into the car
Had someone steal a desktop out of my car

Desktops make a good quick backup because the are not intended to be mobile. A lot of things happen to small items when you start to carry them around everywhere you go. PDA's would not be a good backup for this reason. You backup to the computer, then you back up the data on your computer and you have two backups. If a company is concerned about data loss or lack of administration, specify which folder the information is to be backed up, and then include that folder in the list of things that get covered on the nightly backups.

cell phone companies would love to kill USB.......

[Joe The Dragon]

cell phone companies would love to kill USB and force you to use there Network for syncing / backups and bill you for the data.