What Private Data is Safe to Keep in the Cloud?

Cloud technology is massively gaining favor both in the business and personal sphere. The ease of use to seamlessly store information on multiple devices for little to no cost is something that intrigued millions of people across the globe. With cloud storage becoming something more and more common, the question that arises is, “Is  all of our data safe in the cloud, or are there still some things we should just keep to ourselves?”

The days of keeping all our files, pictures, and music on our computer’s hard drives are inevitably coming to an end. Today, it’s very popular to store and access all kinds of information with just an internet connection and a web browser.

Generally, cloud storage comes with many benefits, so it’s not hard to accept its prevalence in today’s world. Some of the main advantages of cloud storage are:

1. Flexibility and Scalability
2. Usability and Accessibility
3. Convenience and Security

While cloud storage is indeed easily accessible, convenient, versatile, and can store just about anything, that doesn’t mean you should. The fact is that certain things and documents are okay being in the cloud while others should stay far away from it.

Highly regulated documents such as health records, medical research, and personally identifiable data should never be stored in the cloud.

Even though the cloud is extremely secure, and you can take steps to protect your data like encryption or using VPN services like Le VPN, a data breach is always possible. So, you should always think twice about what information you will put on the internet.

#1 Photos and Videos

If there’s something we can say with certainty, it’s that cloud storage is an awesome tool for backing up all manner of photos and videos, from silly snaps to family-precious moments. With good quality cameras on the back of every phone these days, photos and videos are how we record and capture meaningful moments in our lives.

Storing photos and videos with an online storage platform is not only a more convenient way of backing up but also much safer since there’s no fear of accidentally damaging or losing a precious drive or CD.

Backing up your photos and videos in the cloud is very straightforward, and there are tons of options available. For instance, Apple users are well familiar with the iCloud photo library, while Android users’ most popular choices are OneDrive, Flickr, Dropbox, and Google photos.

Finally, don’t forget that you can always store your photos or files on a private cloud if it suits your needs better.

#2 Music

Generally, cloud computing is rapidly revolutionizing the music industry as well as the way digital music is being consumed. Long were the days when you had to buy and download a song over the internet to listen to. Nowadays, consumers are adopting on-demand streaming services.

Before the advent of digital music, physical space limited the amount of music one could keep. However, today, you can have millions of songs in your collection, and for all digital music lovers, cloud storage represents a perfect solution.

When looking for the best cloud storage for music, you should keep a couple of things in mind. First, it’s essential to see how easy it is to stream your music from the cloud service. Secondly, you should keep an eye out for free music storage. For instance, Google Drive and MEGA offer 15 GB of free online music storage, so why not take advantage of that?

Finally, the last thing you should take into account when looking for the best cloud storage for music is cloud security, primarily how protected your files are. With that said, services with zero-knowledge encryption are highly recommended.

#3 Contacts

When was the last time you memorized a phone number? It’s safe to say that we all have tons of contacts, from important ones to less meaningful ones, stored in our phones. Now, imagine that you lost your phone, and all of those years of connection and socializing with people go down the drain because you didn’t back up your contacts. Needless to say, storing contacts in the cloud is important.

Backing up contacts makes any person worry-free as there remains less risk of losing connections. In the case of Android phones, Google automatically backs up your call history, app data, contacts, and more to Google Drive; this feature is usually turned on by default if not selected otherwise by the user.

On the other hand, iPhone users have multiple ways of backing up contacts, one of the most popular ones being iCloud. Storing your contacts on iCloud is an easy task that will only take a couple of minutes of your day and save you a lot of headaches.

Conclusion

Although cloud storage is amazing and very helpful, you must keep in mind that it is not infallible. The truth is that cybercriminals can still get into these files, so you shouldn’t completely depend on your service provider. A few actions from your side will go a long way and help keep your data more secure.

All in all, you should try to avoid storing sensitive information on the cloud as well as make your passwords as strong as possible, and enable two-factor authentication. Encrypting your data before uploading and investing in a VPN provider such as Le VPN is also something you should consider doing as an extra layer of security for your data.