diff --git a/volatility3/cli/__init__.py b/volatility3/cli/__init__.py
index d22fa154a..1933607c3 100644
--- a/volatility3/cli/__init__.py
+++ b/volatility3/cli/__init__.py
@@ -324,7 +324,7 @@ class CommandLine:
             constructed = plugins.construct_plugin(ctx, automagics, plugin, base_config_path, progress_callback,
                                                    self.file_handler_class_factory())
 
-            backup_filename = True
+            backup_filename = constants.BACKUP_EXISTING_CONFIG_OUTPUT
             if args.write_config:
                 vollog.warning('Use of --write-config has been deprecated, replaced by --save-config <filename>')
                 args.save_config = 'config.json'
diff --git a/volatility3/cli/volshell/__init__.py b/volatility3/cli/volshell/__init__.py
index fbf79b117..f3bed1b73 100644
--- a/volatility3/cli/volshell/__init__.py
+++ b/volatility3/cli/volshell/__init__.py
@@ -237,7 +237,7 @@ class VolShell(cli.CommandLine):
             constructed = plugins.construct_plugin(ctx, automagics, plugin, base_config_path, progress_callback,
                                                    self.file_handler_class_factory())
 
-            backup_filename = True
+            backup_filename = constants.BACKUP_EXISTING_CONFIG_OUTPUT
             if args.write_config:
                 vollog.warning('Use of --write-config has been deprecated, replaced by --save-config <filename>')
                 args.save_config = 'config.json'
diff --git a/volatility3/framework/constants/__init__.py b/volatility3/framework/constants/__init__.py
index 665e62d30..4af4408af 100644
--- a/volatility3/framework/constants/__init__.py
+++ b/volatility3/framework/constants/__init__.py
@@ -9,7 +9,7 @@ volatility This includes default scanning block sizes, etc.
 import enum
 import os.path
 import sys
-from typing import Optional, Callable
+from typing import Callable, Optional
 
 import volatility3.framework.constants.linux
 import volatility3.framework.constants.windows
@@ -80,6 +80,7 @@ ProgressCallback = Optional[Callable[[float, str], None]]
 
 OS_CATEGORIES = ['windows', 'mac', 'linux']
 
+
 class Parallelism(enum.IntEnum):
     """An enumeration listing the different types of parallelism applied to
     volatility."""
@@ -100,3 +101,6 @@ OFFLINE = False
 
 REMOTE_ISF_URL = None  # 'http://localhost:8000/banners.json'
 """Remote URL to query for a list of ISF addresses"""
+
+BACKUP_EXISTING_CONFIG_OUTPUT = True
+"""Whether existing files are backed up or overwritten when writing configuration output"""