I would strongly suggest anyone who has important documents to back them up at least to either a thumb drive or an external hard drive since normal hard drives do go bad, also your computer could blow up or be stolen. While working as a tech, especially when I was in the east coast, we did have at least once a month, someone come in for help due to lightning strikes that fired their computer, or they lost their computer, or they dropped their laptop in the pool. Also, I just tried the free program called "folder latch". This is a good program to quickly password protect a folder on your computer that you have sensitive documents. However, also have a non password protected backup in case you forget the password. Also, do this before sending your computer in for warranty repair or before calling a tech to work on it.
Thanks. I tried to download the program but instead I got a downloader for the program. I am very skeptical of downloaders and letting them install programs. I have to do more research about this Spanish company and whether there is possibility this free software installs trackers on the PC.
There is other software that does similar, I tried Microsoft privacy folders from Microsoft, but it did not work on Windows 7 pro. Amazing that Microsoft can't make their own applications compatible with their own operating system. What I do is read the license agreement before I install anything. In the agreement, it says that if you leave checked the toolbar, it will redirect your web traffic, so I did not install the toolbar and everything works fine. There are tons of free software that install addware or spyware, but they usually put that in the license agreement thinking most will not read it. What is cool about this software is that after I use it, the entire folder is gone even from Windows explorer and it also has an option that if someone tries to break in, it will shred the folder.
We use Vaultwise (http://www.vaultwise.com/) to backup our servers. Guys are very personable and always help with questions.