Milwaukee businesses rely on data for everything. Orders, estimates, payroll, production schedules, EHR systems, lab results, client files, project plans. When that data is gone or locked up, the business does not just “slow down.” It can stop.
Most organizations know they should have backups. Fewer can confidently say, “We have tested restores, we know our recovery time, and we know exactly what happens if a server, cloud tenant, or workstation is lost.” That gap is where real damage happens.
This guide breaks down what local businesses really need to know about backup and recovery, why it matters, and how to approach it in a way that fits a Milwaukee SMB budget.
1. The Cost of Data Loss
Data loss is not just an IT problem. It is a business survival problem:
- A 2025 analysis of U.S. businesses found that 93 percent of organizations that experience prolonged data loss of 10 days or more go bankrupt within a year.
- Another U.S. survey found 67.7 percent of businesses reported significant data loss, and downtime for small businesses averaged about 1,410 dollars per minute.
- For SMBs, multiple studies put the average cost of downtime between 8,000 and 25,000 dollars per hour.
Now layer on breach costs:
- IBM’s 2024 Cost of a Data Breach report put the average global breach cost at 4.88 million dollars, a 10 percent increase in a single year.
- For small businesses specifically, the average breach cost ranges from 120,000 to 1.24 million dollars, depending on severity.
For a Milwaukee manufacturer, clinic, or professional firm, that level of impact is not just “painful.” It can be unrecoverable.
Good backup and recovery is one of the few controls that directly reduces that risk. It does not stop every attack, but it can turn a business-ending event into an expensive inconvenience.
2. Why Disaster Recovery Matters
Backup is the copy. Disaster recovery is the plan.
Most businesses have some form of backup in place. A USB drive, a NAS in the server room, or a cloud sync tool. That is better than nothing, but it does not answer the critical questions:
- How fast can we restore if our main server is encrypted or fails
- How much data can we afford to lose between backups
- What if the office floods or burns and the on-site backup is destroyed
- Who is responsible for kicking off the recovery and in what order
Studies on business continuity are blunt:
- One often cited figure shows 94 percent of companies suffering catastrophic data loss never survive, with 43 percent not reopening and 51 percent closing within two years.
A real disaster recovery plan covers:
- Recovery Time Objective (RTO)
How long you can reasonably be down per system. For example, email might tolerate four hours. ERP or EHR might tolerate one hour or less. - Recovery Point Objective (RPO)
How much data loss is acceptable. For some, losing four hours of data entry is survivable. For others, even 30 minutes is a problem. - Runbook and responsibilities
Who calls the MSP, who communicates with staff, who talks to regulators or clients, and in what order systems are restored.
For Milwaukee businesses that have lived through flooding, power issues, or ransomware scares, a tested disaster recovery plan is the difference between scrambling and executing.
3. Cloud vs On-Prem Backup
There is no one perfect approach. A solid backup strategy usually combines both.
On-Prem Backup
On-prem solutions usually involve:
- Backup appliances or NAS devices in your office
- Local copies of server images and key data
- Faster local restore for large volumes of data
Pros:
- Very fast restore speeds for large datasets
- Full control over hardware and configuration
- Helpful for bandwidth-constrained sites
Cons:
- Single-site risk. Flood, fire, theft, or ransomware that hits your network can take out both production and local backups.
- Maintenance burden. Someone must monitor, update, and replace hardware.
Cloud Backup
Cloud-based backup usually means:
- Encrypted backups sent securely to a provider’s data center
- Off-site storage that is isolated from your local network
- Often includes built-in immutability and retention options
Pros:
- Off-site by design, so local disasters do not remove all copies
- Often supports immutable backups that cannot be altered or encrypted by attackers
- Easier to scale as data grows
Cons:
- Restoring very large systems over a limited internet connection can be slower
- Ongoing subscription cost
- Not all cloud backup tools are equal. Some are built for file sync, not true recovery.
The Real Answer: Hybrid
For most Milwaukee SMBs, the right pattern is hybrid backup:
- Local backup appliance for fast everyday restores and quick recovery of files or VMs
- Cloud backup or replication for off-site protection and ransomware-resilient copies
- Regular restore testing so you know both actually work
If your current provider cannot show you when your last test restore happened, that is a red flag.
4. Real Data Breach and Data Loss Stories
It is easy to treat data loss like a distant problem. The reality is that Wisconsin and nearby organizations are seeing serious incidents.
A few examples:
- Group Health Cooperative of South Central Wisconsin
In 2024, the Group Health Cooperative reported that a BlackSuit ransomware attack stole personal and medical data for more than 500,000 patients. Systems had to be taken offline while the incident was contained and investigated. - ConsensioHealth, Wisconsin based medical billing service
In 2023, ConsensioHealth disclosed a ransomware attack affecting over 60,000 individuals, including exposure of protected health information while systems were disrupted and data access was limited. - Johnson Controls global breach
In 2023, Johnson Controls suffered a major cyber incident that later was reported to impact over 76 million households and 7 million small businesses worldwide due to exposed customer records. - Wisconsin DATCP breach list
The Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection maintains a public list of data breaches that affect state consumers, with new incidents being reported every year.
These are mostly larger organizations, but the pattern is clear. Attackers do not care where you are located or how big you are. They care about whether you are easy. Small and mid-sized businesses often have weaker backup and recovery, and that makes them attractive targets.
A 2025 SMB cybersecurity review by StrongDM noted that nearly 40 percent of small businesses reported losing crucial data after an attack and 75 percent said they could not continue operating if hit with ransomware.
Without working, tested backups, “we were down for a few hours” can turn into “we never reopened.”
5. How to Protect Your Business:
Backup is not just a checkbox in your stack. It is one of the first things we look at when we assess a business environment.
Here is how to best approach it:
1. Inventory and Risk Mapping
First, start by mapping:
- What systems you have
- Where your data actually lives
- Which systems are mission critical, important, or nice to have
Then we tie that to RTO and RPO that make sense for your business, not just generic numbers.
2. 3–2–1 Backup Strategy
Next, when it’s time to design backup, focus around the classic pattern:
- At least 3 copies of your data
- Stored on 2 different types of media or platforms
- At least 1 copy off-site and isolated from your main network
In practice, that often means image and file backups locally, plus hardened cloud backups that are immutable for a defined retention period.
3. Ransomware-Aware Backups
Modern threats target backups directly. Counter that with:
- Backup solutions that support immutable restore points
- Separation between production credentials and backup credentials
- Regular monitoring and alerting on backup job health
If an attacker gains access to a server, we do not want them to be able to simply delete or encrypt your backup sets.
4. Documented Disaster Recovery Runbooks
Next, build and maintain a written DR plan that covers:
- Who calls whom
- In what order systems get restored
- How to communicate downtime to staff and customers
- How to handle cyber insurance and regulatory notifications where applicable
This is not theory. We use real scenarios based on your environment and industry.
5. Regular Restore Testing
Backups that have never been tested are not a strategy. They are a hope.
Make sure to schedule test restores and document:
- How long it took
- Any failures or issues
- What needs to be adjusted for next time
You should be able to see proof, not promises.
6. Next Step: Get a Backup and Recovery Health Check
If you had to restore a server today, how confident are you that it would work the first time and within an acceptable window?
If the answer is anything less than “very confident,” it is worth having a direct look at your backup and disaster recovery posture.
Centurion offers Milwaukee businesses a Backup and Disaster Recovery Health Check that includes:
- Review of existing backup tools and policies
- Verification of backup coverage for servers, cloud apps, and key endpoints
- Evaluation of RTO and RPO against business reality
- Identification of single points of failure
- Practical recommendations you can act on, with or without us
No scare tactics. No jargon. Just a clear, honest look at what would really happen if you lost a server, a cloud tenant, or an office tomorrow.
👉 Schedule your Backup and DR Health Check and make sure data loss is a problem you have already planned for, not one you are reacting to after the fact.
