Back up my workstation data

There are times when you need to back up your research data, either for a data use agreement or data management plan, or for peace of mind. This recipe describes two options for backing up your workstation data. Please note that, if your workstation contains sensitive data, the backups will as well and must be secured accordingly.

Prerequisites

Secure your own environment.
Determine the types and classifications of data on your workstation to understand data security requirements for your chosen backup method.

Directions

Work with your IT Pro to help identify a suitable backup solution for your workstation. If you have sensitive data that will be backed up, a good option could be an external disk that self-encrypts data as it is being written.
Aggregate (zip) the data into large files (~ 1 GB), encrypt it, and store in the Scholarly Data Archive (SDA) following the instructions in our Archive PHI recipe.

Additional Resources

If you need help identifying or contacting your IT Pro, contact the UITS Support Center
If you have questions about or need help using the SDA, contact the Research Storage team using the instructions at https://kb.iu.edu/d/aiyi#support
If you need help understanding how to properly protect your backup, contact us at securemyresearch@iu.edu

Approvals

SDA is approved for PHI, but subject to "Shared responsibility model for securing PHI on UITS systems".

We want your feedback

Please email securemyresearch@iu.edu to report errors/omissions and send critiques, suggestions for improvements, new use cases/recipes, or any other positive or negative feedback you might have. It will be your contribution to the Cookbook and appreciated by all who use it.