Best backup solution over external network?

[enemy85]

Good morning,
I'm trying to figure out what could be to best backup solution for my needs/configuration.
At the moment my FreeNAS box serve as backup destination of my office PCs in this way: I created a zvol and an ISCSI device extent for each PC. Every day, each pc automatically backup itself on the nas using "Cobian Backup" free software and everythings works perfectly, BUT at NAS and PCs are on the same LAN...

I'm planning to physically move my NAS box to another place, out of the office, so not being on the same LAN it would be quite hard to make this backup solution working...(i could connect to the nas via VPN but it's really slow and will not be any more an automatic process on the PCs...) so I'm trying to figure out what would be the best network/plugin solution for my needs...

Thanks for the reply!

 

[enemy85]

nobody with any kind of suggestion or just post in the wrong place and should I try asking in the PLUGIN SECTION?

 

[cyberjock]

This is gonna sound harsh, which is why I wasn't going to post yesterday.

1. There is no "best". That being said, your best bet is to do your own research and determine based on cost and other variables the best solution for you. There's no right or wrong answer. Many people will not do any kind of cloud backup for security reasons. In short, we don't know what your needs are, and that's something you'll want to research for yourself.
2. The section you post in really isn't that important. The more experienced posters read almost every ticket.

 

[enemy85]

Thanks for the reply, really no problem for the "harsh" tone :)
You are perfectly right with your answer, but probably i could explain better my doubts:
I can't figure out what is the "difference" between BACULA and CRASHPLAN plugin.
BACULA "should be", for what I understood, a backup plugin but for freenas itself right? It is just useful to send backups from a server to another one or I'm misunderstanding the way it works?
CRASHPLAN instead "should" be just a cloud target for freenas backups (so useless for me) right?

 

[cyberjock]

I know many people here use Crashplan, and to be honest, I'm not sure I've seen anyone use Bacula. I'm sure they are out there, they're just the minority.

As for why Crashplan is more common, I don't know. I don't use cloud backups myself, so I'm not the best person to get advice from on them. I also don't like the idea of someone else having my data. ;)

 

[enemy85]

Ok, I studied! and I figured out the best solution for me it's the rsync service! just discovered DELTACOPY windows client and works perfectly on the same LAN, but should work even on WAN via SSH...just need to try!

 

[Majik]

Hi Enemy85,
I was in the same position as you also with which way to go for the best results. IMO crashplan is not intended for real business use. As cyberjock said, who wants their data in the cloud that someone else controls? This was my biggest issue also. I had installed and tested crashplan and had installed on my windows os systems to backup with it. It ended up uploading ALL of my data from each desktop to their cloud storage. To say the least i was pissed as during installation I did not see any configuration for this. After the fact, I did see a configuration. Fortunatly the data uploaded was not vital.
Getting back to topic........I think if you are seeking what I was, Bacula will work perfectly. You can set it up between servers, between terminals or between terminal(s) to server. I have mine set up from desktops to server (freenas) and then server to remote backup. Depending on how your setup is, you can configure in many different ways between windows os and freenas. Mine is all terminals being windows, server is freenas, and offsite storage is again windows (just an old machine setup only for this).
I hope that helps you out with your quest for the ultimate backup!

 

[enemy85]

Hi Enemy85,
[...]Getting back to topic........I think if you are seeking what I was, Bacula will work perfectly. You can set it up between servers, between terminals or between terminal(s) to server. I have mine set up from desktops to server (freenas) and then server to remote backup. Depending on how your setup is, you can configure in many different ways between windows os and freenas. Mine is all terminals being windows, server is freenas, and offsite storage is again windows (just an old machine setup only for this).
I hope that helps you out with your quest for the ultimate backup!

First of all, thank you for your reply.
Crashplan was discarded from my choices because of its "cloud" nature of the service...(i don't wanna give someone else access to my stuff...)
Now i'm trying to understand if Deltacopy windows client and Rsync freenas service can be suitable for me. Just started to understande how rsync works and need more time to practice...
Concerning BACULA, i couldn't understand how it works exactly...from an internet research i thought it was quite complicated to set it up and far far more "professional" for my actual needs (just backup few windows pc, incremental would be perfect...)
Would you mind to explain a little better how did you managed to set it up on freenas and on your windows PCs? I'm a bit confused from all the listed components of the service as reported here...do i need all of them???
thanks for the help

 

[budmannxx]

A few of you have talked about not using crashplan due to not wanting them to have access to your data. I've been interested in them because they have a security option where you provide your own encryption key, so they cannot see your data even if they want to. Obviously their app isn't open source so there's some risk, but that option should alleviate some of the concern. They list the pros (highest security) and cons (no ability for them to "reset your password" if you lose your decryption key) on their website. I'm on mobile so I can't find the link right now.

Has anyone gotten crashplan to work with this security option? Incremental and/or differential backups with encryption before sending to the cloud would be great for anyone that can't set up their own off site backup.

 

[cyberjock]

A few of you have talked about not using crashplan due to not wanting them to have access to your data. I've been interested in them because they have a security option where you provide your own encryption key, so they cannot see your data even if they want to. Obviously their app isn't open source so there's some risk, but that option should alleviate some of the concern. They list the pros (highest security) and cons (no ability for them to "reset your password" if you lose your decryption key) on their website. I'm on mobile so I can't find the link right now.

Has anyone gotten crashplan to work with this security option? Incremental and/or differential backups with encryption before sending to the cloud would be great for anyone that can't set up their own off site backup.

If you look carefully at how it works, it's like this: (This is from what i've heard and read.. feel free to do your own research and correct me if I'm wrong.. I don't use Crashplan).

1. You don't generate the key. Crashplan generates the key. So clearly if they are generating it, they could keep a copy for themselves or have some kind of vulnerability involving the generation of the key.
2. In the event you have to recover, you don't provide the decryption key.. you provide a password. So clearly not "as secure" as some would want to think.
3. Normally, if you wanted to change your security, you'd make a new key with a new password. Oh, but your data is apparently always encrypted with the same key and cannot be changed. But you can change the password to unlock the key.

So I'd argue that you really aren't making your data any safer if you are worried about people getting their hands on your data that shouldn't. Your data, as it resides on the actual media(hard drive or whatever) is safe if you ONLY have the media. But Crashplan doesn't have "just the media". They are responsible for the media, they keys, and they must get your password(either sent to the server or handled on the client). So you are still choosing to trust them regardless. And if you are already choosing to trust them, why even concern yourself with the encryption?

 

[budmannxx]

cyberjock, I believe your info was correct but is now a bit out of date. I'll do some research and post more details in a few hours when I'm in front of a PC.

 

[Majik]

First of all, thank you for your reply.
Crashplan was discarded from my choices because of its "cloud" nature of the service...(i don't wanna give someone else access to my stuff...)
Now i'm trying to understand if Deltacopy windows client and Rsync freenas service can be suitable for me. Just started to understande how rsync works and need more time to practice...
Concerning BACULA, i couldn't understand how it works exactly...from an internet research i thought it was quite complicated to set it up and far far more "professional" for my actual needs (just backup few windows pc, incremental would be perfect...)
Would you mind to explain a little better how did you managed to set it up on freenas and on your windows PCs? I'm a bit confused from all the listed components of the service as reported here...do i need all of them???
thanks for the help

Well to be honest with you it took me days to figure out how to get it all set up and working properly. If it all crashed now the only thing i would have left is the data that i require....thankfully for that! As this was done a while back I would have to go back in and check all of my settings to try and refresh myself how things are set up. From what I recall thing did make sense afterwards once it is functional. Maybe what i will do is make a youtube video showing it as to the way my system has been done and then you can try to copy it and see how it works. I am somewhat disappointed with the install and configuration setup on the web in general. This might be what many people require if they are considering using this. Let me work on it a bit and see what i can muster up.

 

[budmannxx]

...I'll do some research and post more details in a few hours when I'm in front of a PC.

Here's what I found:

Crashplan has 3 "levels" (my term) of security. The tradeoff for each increased level of security is (essentially) a decrease in convenience.

For all levels of security, your data is encrypted with either a 128- (free account) or 448-bit (subscription account) key. The differences are who creates the key and what your options are if you lose the key.

Level 1: the key is created by the Crashplan app, and it's secured with your Crashplan account password.
Pros: very easy to set up; if you forget your account password, they can reset it for you and you keep your backed-up data
Cons: they create the key for you, and can reset your password. So they effectively have access to your data.

Level 2: the key is created by the app, but it is secured by a passphrase of your choosing. You can also set a security question and answer, which allows them to reset your passphrase if you forget it.
Pros: Crashplan apparently doesn't know the key, but since they know how it was generated, they probably could know it. And if they can reset your passphrase, I'm sure they can access your data.
Cons: they can probably access your data.

Level 3: you provide your own key. The key is never transmitted to Crashplan.
Pros: highest level of security; Crashplan cannot access your data.
Cons: they cannot help you if you lose your key. You'll have to start a new backup from scratch if you cant find your key.

For me personally, the only level I'd consider is #3. I'd be very interested in getting that to work with FreeNAS (not saying it doesn't; I just haven't tried yet).

All the info above was found on Crashplan's website. They go into a decent amount of detail. I'll try to add some links to this post at some point soon.

Ideally I wouldn't have to rely on a 3rd party for off-site backup of my data, but Crashplan does seem like a pretty good compromise between convenience and security. I have no affiliation with them, just considering them as an option for me.

Would love to hear everyone's thoughts.

 

[Majik]

Good Find Budmannxx!
I think still for me personally that I like to have the control of my data so a cloud backup does nothing for me. If just music or something benign then it would be a great solution. On the flip side to this, if you have the ability to sync data to an off-site computer through Crashplan I would certainly be interested also as Bacula is a real pain to configure. I like the idea of "Level 3" that you can create/provide your own key and off you go. The windows version seemed to have a nice GUI to it so it certainly leads itself to be a more convincing user friendly service.
I'd be interested to see what people are testing and how the results are. Maybe I will test it also and post some results

 

[toadman]

if you have the ability to sync data to an off-site computer through Crashplan I would certainly be interested also

I've done just that with crashplan. You don't have to backup to their cloud storage. You can backup to a local drive, another machine running Crashplan, or their cloud service. So for your own backup of a client you could run Crashplan on a server and back up to that server. If you wanted a 2nd backup you could either (1) backup the first server to a 2nd server, or (2) backup from the client to two different servers at the same time.

I haven't used Crashplan in a while as I now backup my PCs with an imaging product to FreeNAS, then replicate FreeNAS to a 2nd FreeNAS. When I was using it I did get Crashplan to work with both Windows and Linux (both local GUI and a headless setup), but I never tried the FreeNAS plugin. I found it to work very well, at least for my needs at the time.

This link lists the basic feature set... http://www.code42.com/crashplan/features/compare/

 

[budmannxx]

Yes, you can backup to another computer you control, via Crashplan (and without a paid subscription!), but if I had access to an offsite computer, I'd probably just set up FreeNAS there and use snapshots and replication.

I'd like to have the convenience of the cloud (mostly that someone else is responsible for maintaining the servers) with the security of strong encryption where only I have the decryption key.

Crashplan seems to have a service that satisfies my preferences, just not sure (yet) if it can be made to work with FreeNAS.

Obviously the security and convenience tradeoffs are different for every person.

 

[toadman]

Yea, let us know. I would think the plugin should work for you as intended, assuming the plugin works in whatever version of FreeNAS you are running.