How Safe Is My Data?

Cloud-Based CRM Data Security

Data security has become one of the biggest concerns of the 21st century, as our social lives, businesses, health, wealth and just about everything else now rely on technology.

Many people still worry that web or cloud-based applications provide inferior security to on-premise, or ‘in-house’, systems. But this is far from being true. Cloud-based software has a much higher standard of security than your average in-house tech.

In fact, the high level of security is one of the biggest benefits of using cloud-based software. Data security is the bread and butter for cloud software providers, using the latest encryption systems to keep your data safe and guarantee security and accessibility.

Another bonus compared to an in-house system is the time that it takes for a potential cyber-attack to be discovered and thwarted. With around-the-clock detection and a team of experts in place, immediate action is taken to foil any attack. Should a system crash for whatever reason, they can use an automated backup workflow to restore the data immediately. This is hard to achieve with an in-house system as the team is unlikely to be working 24/7 for a start.

Your CRM Data Security

Aside from security reasons, a good reason for using a cloud-based CRM system is the agility it provides, letting your team access it from anywhere.

Updated in real-time, through your web-browser, when you logout, that’s it, there’s no data left on your device. So, if you were to lose your phone or laptop your data is secure, without your logon details no-one will be able to access the CRM.

SpotlerCRM – How Safe is My Data?

When people ask “How safe is my data in your CRM system” they are actually asking a wider range of questions than they might realise! Let’s break this one question down into several subsidiary questions.

Who will see my data?

Only users that you have given login details to will see your data. If you want our support team to access your CRM system, perhaps to help with a technical issues or customisation, they will ask your permission before logging on. You can further restrict what data your users can access using User Permission Levels.

If I use the Free Plan, will you sell my data?

No, absolutely not! We are always amazed when people ask this question, possibly because it is common practice in the USA. It is illegal in the UK and Europe to trade in people’s data, under GDPR, and we wouldn’t do that even if it was legal.

Who owns the data in my CRM system?

You do, as per our Subscription Agreement.

Can I see who has accessed my data?

All logins by your users and our support team are logged in the System Log which you can see at any time.

Is there an Audit Trail?

All modifications to data in your CRM system are stamped with the time and date modified and who by. Similarly, any data exports are logged.

Can I stop users from downloading the data?

You can configure the system to restrict the data that users can include in reports, and you can prohibit users from downloading the data. See our Customer Support Hub for Managing Users.

Can I get the data back from the CRM if I want to?

Yes, your system administrator can download all the data whenever they want to.

Is my data backed up?

We have multiple backup systems. All live data is replicated in real-time from our production systems to our failover systems. Additionally, we take a “snapshot” of everybody’s data at 23:00 GMT every evening and store it offsite in a fireproof safe. In over 18 years of operation we have never lost any customer’s data.

Where is the data stored?

Our production data storage is in a Google Cloud data centre in Belgium. Our failover data storage is in an Amazon Web Services data centre in Stockholm. We use two different suppliers for our production and failover systems to cover for the unlikely event that Google goes bankrupt or fails completely.

Could my data be hacked?

We have a number of levels of security protecting the system from hackers. In our history, we have experienced two serious hacking attempts, one a DDOS (distributed denial of service) attack and one a ransomware attack, both of which were unsuccessful for the hackers. No data was lost in either case, nor did they result in any significant downtime and no, we didn’t pay the attackers!

Does SpotlerCRM comply with legislation?

SpotlerCRM is registered under the UK Data Protection Act. We also comply with GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation), the world’s strictest data privacy legislation that covers all EU citizen’s data worldwide. Additionally, we comply with HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) which covers the storage of US citizen’s health data. Finally, we comply with CCPA (California Consumer Privacy Act) and Australia’s Privacy Act.

All in all, without sounding like we’re boasting, we think your data is safer with us than with you – and it certainly won’t be stolen with your laptop.