Securely backup your Raspberry Pi files and folders over the internet using cloud storage services.

Learn how to setup automated backups for your Raspberry Pi, ensuring data safety and easy accessibility from anywhere in the world. …


Updated October 12, 2023

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Learn how to setup automated backups for your Raspberry Pi, ensuring data safety and easy accessibility from anywhere in the world.

Introduction

Backing up your Raspberry Pi is essential to ensure that your important files and folders are safe from any hardware failure or system crash. In this article, we will explore how to backup your Raspberry Pi remotely using cloud storage services such as Google Drive, Dropbox, or Nextcloud. We will also discuss some best practices for securing the backup process.

Prerequisites

  • A Raspberry Pi with internet access and an installed operating system (Raspbian, Ubuntu, etc.)
  • An account on a cloud storage service of your choice (Google Drive, Dropbox, Nextcloud, etc.)
  • Basic knowledge of command line operations in Linux

Step 1: Install the required packages

Firstly, you need to install the necessary tools and packages for remote backup. Open a terminal window and run the following commands to update the package list and install rsync, which is a utility for synchronizing files and directories:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install rsync

Next, install the cloud storage client for your chosen service (e.g., Google Drive, Dropbox, or Nextcloud). Here are some examples:

For Google Drive:

  1. Install the official Google Drive client from here.
  2. Follow the instructions to set up the client and authorize it with your Google account.
mkdir -p ~/.config/gdrive
wget https://github.com/gsuitedevs/drive/releases/download/v2.1.0/drive_linux_arm64_2.1.0.tar.gz
tar xf drive_linux_arm64_2.1.0.tar.gz
sudo cp drive /usr/local/bin/

For Dropbox:

  1. Install the official Dropbox client from here.
  2. Follow the instructions to set up the client and authorize it with your Dropbox account.

For Nextcloud:

Nextcloud provides a dedicated command-line tool called ncfs. You can install it using the following commands:

sudo apt-get install python3-pip
pip3 install ncfs

Follow the instructions to set up the client and authorize it with your Nextcloud account.

Step 2: Create a backup script

Create a new file called backup.sh in your home directory using your favorite text editor (e.g., nano, vim). Add the following content, replacing <SOURCE_DIRECTORY> and <DESTINATION> with your desired source folder and remote storage location:

#!/bin/bash
rsync -avz --delete <SOURCE_DIRECTORY> <DESTINATION>

Make the script executable by running:

chmod +x backup.sh

Step 3: Schedule automatic backups using cron

To schedule your backups to run automatically, open the crontab editor with the command crontab -e and add a new line at the end of the file:

0 */4 * * * * /home/pi/backup.sh >/dev/null 2>&1

This will run the backup script every 4 hours, sending all output to /dev/null (to avoid email notifications). Adjust the schedule according to your needs.

Step 4: Test your backups

Before relying on the automatic backups, it’s essential to test them manually. Run the backup.sh script and verify that your files have been successfully uploaded to the remote storage service:

./backup.sh

Conclusion

By following these steps, you can now backup your Raspberry Pi remotely using cloud storage services such as Google Drive, Dropbox, or Nextcloud. Regular backups ensure that your data is secure and accessible from anywhere in the world. Remember to keep your cloud credentials safe and consider encrypting sensitive files before uploading them.