Why do I need to protect my data?

Due to damage to your computer, computer viruses, or flaws in software the information on your computer might get lost and in most cases can not easily be restored or found back. It is like protecting your house or office against theft of fire. You lock your home or office to prevent thieves from coming in and steal your possessions. And in order to prevent your (paper) documents from getting lost by damage of e.g. fire, you can make a copy of it ans store it somewhere. In case of fire you will still have that copy and you will not completely have lost your documents. You can do the same with the (important) information on your computer and hence prevent that information from getting lost or stolen. It is always harder to retrieve of restore the data than prevent it from getting damaged or stolen.