OK, looks like many responses have the same misunderstanding here.
To find out if something is a backup or not, ask a simple question: does the availability of the data on it correlate with what's happening to the system it's backing up?
If the answer is no, then it's not a backup.
Whether your tape storage gets nuked or not does not, in any way, correlate with whether your system gets hacked into, or whether someone who has a grudge against you messes with your system.
Then P(data loss) = P(system is fucked) x P(backup is fucked).
If your backup is not decoupled from the system, then P(data loss) = P(system is fucked) -- which is a far larger.
You don't need to take your tapes to Everest. You just need to decouple them from the source.
TL;DR: if you can destroy a backup from the system it's backing up, it's not a backup :)
I back up to Dropbox and an external hard drive next to my machine. I've used both to restore my data on hard drive death.
I can't imagine the amount of time and/or money it would take to do what you want. It certainly doesn't seem like it is something most computer users would do.
I can set anyone up with a (for example) iCloud + time machine backup with very little work, and it will keep ticking over, backing up. What's your suggestion exactly?
To find out if something is a backup or not, ask a simple question: does the availability of the data on it correlate with what's happening to the system it's backing up?
If the answer is no, then it's not a backup.
Whether your tape storage gets nuked or not does not, in any way, correlate with whether your system gets hacked into, or whether someone who has a grudge against you messes with your system.
Then P(data loss) = P(system is fucked) x P(backup is fucked).
If your backup is not decoupled from the system, then P(data loss) = P(system is fucked) -- which is a far larger.
You don't need to take your tapes to Everest. You just need to decouple them from the source.
TL;DR: if you can destroy a backup from the system it's backing up, it's not a backup :)