A survey by software security firm Symantec has revealed that correct computer data recovery actions are not being done by companies and small businesses, partly because they are not informed well about cloud computing or similar systems that feature virtual servers. Instead of daily backups, up to 82 percent of businesses are doing them weekly or even monthly, the Disaster Recovery Study showed. Moreover, downtimes have lasted six hours on average in countries like New Zealand and Australia, even though two hours is the expected duration for that kind of maintenance. Symantec asked businesses with at least 5,000 workers and identified a minimum of three issues with cloud computing, virtualization and a general lack of know-how in performing computer data recovery. “What we’ve found is that virtualization and the cloud are making disaster recovery a lot more complex. More and more applications are being used, more is going into the cloud and less than 25 percent of this data is being protected in the event of a disaster,” said Brad Newton, a spokesman for Symantec. The company advises businesses to revamp their computer data recovery procedures to make sure that their critical data is consistent and secure across all platforms.