It's All About Security

PerfectBackup Offsite Backup Server – “Secure, Robust and Reliable.”   Security is at the heart of PerfectBackup's code of best practices.  Unlike most other online backup solutions we offer a backup solution which is totally secure which means only authorized members of staff have access to your business data. 

Introduction
This page details the security measures within the PerfectBackup Online Backup software from the user’s perspective.  It acts as a reference when addressing potential security questions when using our offsite backup solution.

Secure 128-bit SSL communication
Your data is transmitted between PerfectBackup Offsite Storage and your IT infrastructure (Computers and or Servers)  is transported via the internet in a 128-bit SSL (Secure Socket Layer) channel. This means your data is encrypted using the same technology employed by banks and military.  Although all your backup files travel through a public network (internet), because of the high level of data encryption used eavesdroppers have no knowledge of what has been exchanged.

Your Business Backup Data is Securely Encrypted
Prior to transmitting, your files are first zipped (compressed) and encrypted with your pre-defined encrypting key before they are sent to PerfectBackup backup offsite storage facility. To all people but you, your files stored on PerfectBackup backup server are no more than random garbage files with zero content.  So in the unlikely even that and unauthorised user gained access to our data centre, your data will still be totally unavailable and unreadable to anybody other you.

Encrypting key are well protected
The  key which is used to encrypt your your business data is held only on your computer and is only ever known only to you and authorized members of staff.  For obvious security reasons it is never transmitted anywhere across your network or the internet, therefore, even PerfectBackup system administrators and support staff will not be able to decrypt and view the content of your files stored on the backup server without your permission. Please bear in mind, this means if the encrypting key is lost, you will never be able to recover your backup files.

Technical Details
Your encryption key for the different backup sets are stored the config.sys file, which is encoded by a proprietary algorithm:
(Windows) C:Documents and Settingsadministrator.obmconfigconfig.sys
(Linux) ~/.obm/config/config.sys
(Mac OS X) ~/.obm/config/config.sys

If client software cannot locate the config.sys (due to accidental deletion or logon to a new machine with the same account), it will prompt the user to re-enter the encrypting key for the backup set and then store it in the local config.sys.

Always use the Best encryption algorithm Available
Currently, the algorithm that we are using to encrypt your files is 128-bit Twofish.  As already mentioned, this technology is currently being used by national banks and the military.  It is a block cipher designed by Counterpane Labs. It was also one of the five Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) finalists chosen by National Institute of Standard and Technology (NIST). It subjects to frequent public reviews but no known attack against this algorithm has been reported. 

Require 8.77 x 1017 years to crack the 128-bit encryption
A 128-bit key size has 2128 or around 3.4 x 1038 possible combination. Even if you have the world best super computer, ASCI White, SP Power3 375 MHz manufactured by IBM as of November 2000, it would take 8.77 x 1017years to test all combinations. Assuming your have the super computer, ASCI White, SP Power3 375 MHz has 8192 processors which totals a capability of 12.3 teraflops (trillions of operations/second), available to you. Also it just needs one computer operation to test a possible combination (which is already faster than what it can do). To use brute force attack (checking all combinations) on this encryption algorithm. It would take 876,530,835,323,573,935 years or 8.77 x 1017 years to successfully try all combinations. Let alone ASCI White cannot process as fast as what described here. You can be sure that your data stored on our server is 100% secured.

Restrict access to data by IP addresses
You can also restrict access to your backup files from the set of IP addresses you defined. If someone tries to access your data from an IP address not on your defined list, their access will be denied. This additional security ensures backup files are not open to all location, even username and password are known.