The importance of having a good backup of all your data so you can restore the same when needed is known to all! This is why there is an increased demand for reliable and effective cloud storage services.
And, this need is not even restricted to only the data on your computing devices; you also need to back up the data on the cloud.
The various online backup providers not only provide a vast amount of storage space on the cloud, but also provide you with the ability to recover the stored data and offer you access to the data from anywhere and at any time.
Yet, there are so many cloud backup and storage solutions available on the market that you might be confused as to which one to select.
This is where we intend to help you out as we will pitch two highly popular cloud backup providers, namely CloudAlly and Backupify, against each other.
We will compare CloudAlly with Backupify by listing the features of both and discussing their pros and cons. The objective is to help you make an informed selection according to your cloud storage requirements as well as file syncing and recovery needs.
The unique thing about CloudAlly and Backupify is that both enable you to backup data that is stored in the various online services that you use. So, they back up information from your online accounts with Google App, Salesforce, Amazon S3 secure storage, Office 365, and so on.
In a sense, these two are the perfect examples of cloud-to-cloud backup providers. They even give you the ability to go back to your chat history by backing them up as well. Clearly, these cloud backup tools are not only useful for individuals but also for businesses.
Backupify was founded in 2008 and helps in the retention of your online data and its independent management. It also maintains the data backups till you cancel or delete your Backupify account.
The same holds true for CloudAlly, which was founded a little later in 2010. It too supports the retention of daily data archives till your account is cancelled and places no limitations on the storage. With backups on a daily basis, this cloud-to-cloud storage provider also helps you reduce your on-premises storage requirements.
Let us now pit these two top cloud backup services against each other in terms of the various features offered by them.
Security and Compliance
The most important parameter on which to judge any cloud storage or backup provider is the security it offers for your data files. This is because, if your files are not secure, all other features will amount to nothing as it is ultimately all about the data.
Backupify
Backupify uses the highly secure Amazon S3 cloud servers for the backups of all your cloud accounts. These servers are protected with Secure Sockets Layer (SSL).
Backupify also provides end-to-end AES 256-bit encryption for your data that is being transferred to the cloud and even while it is stored on the cloud. Such a high level of encryption ensures that your data remains safe at all times, even against any unauthorized attempts to access the same.
For your Backupify account, you also get a unique encryption key (AES 256-bit) that is used to encrypt all the data before is it stored.
In addition, for additional security, Backupify complies with the following:
- Service Organization Controls (SOC) 2 Type II Audit
- ISO 27000 Certification
- Cloud Security Alliance
- NIST Security Publications
- US Department of Commerce Safe Harbor Program
- Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)
To ensure the privacy of your data, this cloud backup provider also permanently deletes all your data files once you close or cancel your account. This is done to avoid your data being accessed by anyone, even after you no longer avail their services. Hence, it makes sense to download all your files to your local computing device before closing your Backupify account.
CloudAlly
This backup provider uses SSL-enabled servers for the protection of your data and even obliges with different data security laws by giving you the choice of selecting the server location as US (default), EU or Australia.
Just like Backupify, CloudAlly too offers AES 256-bit encryption for your data during the transit to the servers and even while they are at saved on the cloud.
CloudAlly supports additional security and confidentiality protocols by complying with the following:
- ISO 27001 Certification
- HIPAA
With regard to maintaining the privacy of your data after your account is closed or cancelled, CloudAlly does exactly the same thing that Backupify does by allowing you to locally download the files before they are deleted permanently. Also, this service does not store any of your login credentials (username or password). Instead, it allows secure an authorized access to the data through the use of tokens.
Winner
While both CloudAlly and Backupify offer great encryption standards for all your data, Backupify had a slight edge over CloudAlly because it also provides numerous compliances with different security standards and protocols.
Reliability
Both cloud-to-cloud backup and recovery solutions offer an uptime guarantee of about 99% for their SSL-enabled servers. So, you can rest assured about getting access to their servers most of the time, except during certain maintenance periods and you will be informed of these well in advance.
Also, both support data duplication on their servers, which is likely to make your data available when you need it.
Winner
They are way too similar in terms of the reliability of their servers and availability of data, which is why we consider it as a tie between the two.
Backup and Restore
Backupify
This cloud backup solution enables the backups of various cloud accounts, including Salesforce, Box, Google Apps, and Office 365. It may help you initiate your first-time backup process in a day’s time and you can then have quick automatic data backups on a daily basis.
If you identify a particular file as being lost and wish to restore it from the backup on the Backupify servers, you can easily search for the same, even if you do not know the file name or when it was created. Initially, it did not offer support for file versioning initially, but, ever since Datto has acquired Backupify, it has even been possible to maintain different versions of the same file (based on the number of revisions it undergoes).
One drawback of Backupify is that it does not save files during the restoration with any tags. So, it becomes difficult to identify or spot a Backupify file.
CloudAlly
CloudAlly enables you to back up all your online data in one place from multiple cloud accounts, such as Google Apps, Office 365 Exchange, SharePoint or OneDrive, and Salesforce.
The first-time backup process may take a while to initiate, but, once it begins, you can quickly make data backups on a daily basis. And, CloudAlly enables you to archive user backups for an indefinite amount of time with its “backup pause” functionality.
When you need to restore any of your files, you simply have to search your CloudAlly account backups. During the restoration, the data files are stored with the “CloudAlly Restore” tag (sub-folder name) along with a date and time stamp.
This helps you avoid accidentally over-writing files which have the same name. It is even possible for you to restore your data locally by downloading a zip file or directly to a different user’s account, if required.
Moreover, you can export the data, with a single click, in various formats, such as .eml, .vcf, and .pst (for Outlook).
Winner
CloudAlly is the winner here as it offers more export options and the ability to identify the backup files easily (through tags).
Ease of Use
Backupify
Backupify has a simple user interface. However, it is slightly time consuming to set up your account initially, as it requires you to sign-up for different services separately.
However, once the initial account setup is done, the backups can be triggered or initiated with complete ease.
CloudAlly
It is always easy to manage things from a single place, especially if you are dealing with numerous cloud services or accounts. And, this where CloudAlly helps you; it enables you to maintain all your backups from a single admin dashboard or console. This saves time that would otherwise have been spent in signing up for different services and managing them. It also eliminates manual administration efforts by supporting automated processes.
You can easily initiate new backups for all your services through the CloudAlly dashboard itself by simply using the relevant login information.
Winner
CloudAlly is easier to use, as it can handle multiple cloud accounts from a single management console, unlike Backupify.
Pricing
Let us now compare the starting prices for common cloud service backup plans offered by both CloudAlly and Backupify.
| Google Apps | Salesforce | |
| Backupify | $3.00 per month per user (Professional) or $4.00 per month per user (Enterprise) | $199.00 per month per instance (Basic) or $499.00 per month per instance (Professional) or $799.00 per month per instance (Enterprise) |
| CloudAlly | $3.00 per month per user or $30.00 per year per user (annual subscription) | $3.00 per month per user or $30.00 per year per user (annual subscription) |
Other Features
Backupify
With this cloud backup provider, you can make backups of social media accounts, such as Facebook and Twitter. You also get advanced admin control with the audit log of account activity and configurable data retention. The backups of your Google Apps data (Gmail, Drive, Contacts, Calendar, and so on) happen thrice a day with Backupify.
CloudAlly
It enables backups to be made for AWS simple or dynamo DB, chats from instant messengers, and so on. The backups (even for Google Apps data) happen once a day at either 2 o’clock or at a time specified by you. It also supports unlimited archive retention and give you the ability to recover data quickly from any point in time.
Winner
There is no clear winner for this category.
Cons
Backupify
- There is no easy identification of Backupify files during the restoration, as there is no tag.
- There is no single admin console for all your cloud service accounts.
CloudAlly
- It does not comply with Cloud Security Alliance or NIST Security Publications.
- No backups are made of social networking accounts, such as Facebook business pages or Twitter pages.
The Verdict
There may be many cloud-to-cloud backup and restoration providers on the market, but we have tried to compare two of the best in the business.
While both CloudAlly and Backupify have their fair share of pros and cons, CloudAlly has a small edge over Backupify with its better ease of use, easy tagging of files, more export options, and so on. However, if you need social media backups, then Backupify should be your preferred choice.
Feel free to share your valuable experience in case you have used CloudAlly or Backupify previously.
