6 best practices for saving documents securely on the cloud

Remember what life was like before cloud storage?

Let’s not beat around the bush - it was a pain. Emails to yourself, USB sticks and countless episodes of productivity taking a hit when a particular file wasn’t immediately to hand made local storage a frustrating affair.

Now, we can simply store any file on a cloud storage service and access it no matter where we are or what device we have to hand.

There are some best practices to bear in mind, though, and in this blog, we’ve picked out six of the most important.

1. Keep it organised

Cloud file storage isn’t much use if you can never find what you’re looking for. Your folder and file structure therefore needs to be simple, intuitive and obvious.

Here’s a few tips:

• name your folders according to their function - i.e. ‘accounts’ rather than ‘Jeff’s folder’;
• if you have a bunch of documents that abide by the same rules or common compliance, keep them together to make archiving and deleting easier; and
• avoid having more than three levels of folders.

Most importantly - be consistent and don’t mix file management techniques.

2. Make it easy to find stuff

The search facilities built into operating systems and web browsers are increasingly capable of finding even the most obscure files, but you can make their (and your) life easier.

If you’re given the option to ‘tag’ files - use it, and always use descriptive file names rather than acronyms to ensure you can find anything you need without using complex search terms.

Remember that other people might need to search for a file you've uploaded so it needs to be easy for others to find as well. 

3. Be consistent with naming conventions

A common reason for the inability to find files is usually inconsistent naming conventions.

Follow this guide when naming your files:

• name them based on their function;
• use names that are meaningful to everyone; and
• don’t include information that the operating system will offer by default (file date, type, author, etc).

It's usually a good idea to agree some internal naming conventions that everyone in the company knows and understands - whether this be client names or common document types (reports, proposals, invoices etc.), make sure it's consistent. 

4. Think collaboration

One of the main benefits of cloud file storage is the ability to more easily collaborate on documents with colleagues.

With that in mind, make sure offline copies of files aren’t commonplace, use collaboration options such as commenting and, if you can, ‘follow’ documents so you always know their latest status.

Version control is also important to consider so files aren't completely overwritten every time someone wants to make an amend. 

5. User permissions

Not everyone will need access to the same document, depending on the content and function.

This is particularly the case with confidential data, therefore you should make use of the permission options offered by most cloud storage service providers.

If different levels of access are available (for instance, ‘read-only’, ‘read and write’), set them appropriately based on the needs of the user and the business. 

6. Keep it secure

Moving your document storage to the cloud presents a number of security challenges, most of which can be mitigated if you do the following:

• only use cloud storage services that offer end-to-end encryption;
• eradicate local storage of confidential documents; and
• if you need to use email for sending documents held on the cloud, ensure whatever platform you use is encrypting the data, too.

Service providers will do all they can to keep your data safe, but your internal policies and procedures are capable of undoing their good work if there’s no security-first mindset.

Whether you’ve been using file sharing for several years or are considering moving your local file system to the cloud, use our tips above to ensure you’re doing it in the most efficient, secure way possible.