Disclosed are an apparatus and methods of performing a secure backup of at least one data file via an agent application. According to one example, the method may include determining the at least one data file requires a mirror backup file, and determining that the at least one data file is a candidate for de-duplication based on at least one data file characteristic. The method may also include creating a filekey based on at least a portion of the content of the at least one data file, and transmitting the filekey to a database query handler associated with a database to determine if the file has been de-duplicated.