Last Updated on August 26, 2026 by Mat Diekhake

Short answer: Yes — BackupPC is a legitimate, long‑standing open‑source backup system with transparent development, public source code, strong security practices, and a proven operating history.

This is the complete legitimacy profile.

1. Company Overview & History

BackupPC is an open‑source, high‑performance backup system designed for Linux/Unix servers, Windows clients, and networked environments. It is widely used by sysadmins, universities, SMBs, and enterprises that prefer self‑hosted, deduplicated backup infrastructure.

Key historical milestones:

  • Early 2000s: BackupPC project created
  • 2001–2010: Rapid adoption due to efficient deduplication and network‑based backups
  • 2015–2020: Major updates including modern web UI, improved compression, and enhanced scheduling
  • 2020–2024: Continued development with community contributions, security improvements, and compatibility updates
  • Adoption across global IT, academic, and enterprise environments

BackupPC has operated for more than two decades, serving technical users, SMBs, enterprises, and regulated industries.

2. Ownership & Corporate Structure

BackupPC is not a corporation — it is an open‑source project maintained by a core developer and community contributors.

Key ownership facts:

  • Independent open‑source project
  • Source code publicly available on GitHub
  • Maintained primarily by developer Craig Barratt, with contributions from global community members
  • No parent company; no proprietary licensing
  • Transparent development model with public issue tracking and release cycles

This structure is fully disclosed and transparent.

3. Leadership & Governance

BackupPC’s governance is open and community‑driven.

Key leadership:

  • Craig Barratt — Creator and lead maintainer
  • Additional contributors from global developer and sysadmin communities
  • Public governance through GitHub issues, pull requests, and release notes

Governance signals:

  • Fully transparent development history
  • Public documentation, changelogs, and technical design notes
  • Open security discussions and community‑validated improvements
  • Clear versioning and predictable release cadence

This level of transparency is typical of legitimate, mature open‑source software projects.

4. Security, Compliance & Trust Signals

BackupPC provides strong security features suitable for technical and regulated environments.

Trust indicators:

  • Client‑server architecture with secure authentication
  • Deduplication and compression for efficient storage
  • Support for rsync, SMB, tar, and other secure transport methods
  • Web‑based management with access control
  • Used in universities, SMBs, MSPs, government, and enterprise IT environments
  • Compatible with hardened server deployments and secure storage backends

These signals strongly support legitimacy.

5. Financial Transparency

As an open‑source project, BackupPC does not publish corporate financials, but it provides:

  • Transparent development activity
  • Public sponsorship options
  • Open documentation and release notes
  • Clear licensing under GPLv2

This level of transparency is typical for open‑source software projects.

6. Reputation & Industry Standing

BackupPC is widely used by:

  • Sysadmins
  • Developers
  • Universities
  • Managed service providers (MSPs)
  • Small and medium‑sized businesses
  • Government and regulated organizations (where open‑source is approved)

Industry standing:

  • Strong reputation for reliability, deduplication efficiency, and long‑term stability
  • Competitive positioning alongside Bacula, Bareos, UrBackup, rsync‑based systems, and Veeam Community Edition
  • Long‑term adoption across global IT environments
  • Positive reviews from sysadmins and open‑source communities

Its reputation is strong in the backup‑software and open‑source tooling market.

7. Final Verdict: Is BackupPC Legit?

Yes. BackupPC is fully legitimate.

It is:

  • A long‑standing open‑source project with transparent governance
  • Maintained by identifiable developers with public contribution history
  • Equipped with secure, efficient backup architecture
  • Used by universities, sysadmins, MSPs, SMBs, enterprises, and regulated industries
  • Supported by a long operating history and strong community reputation

There are no scam indicators, no red flags, and no legitimacy concerns.

Website: backuppc.com