Disaster Recovery: September Is National Preparedness Month

National Preparedness Month has been recognized annually in the United States every September since 2004. This important initiative, sponsored by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), encourages individuals to take proactive measures to prepare for emergencies in various settings such as businesses, homes, schools, and communities.

Understanding Disaster Recovery

Disaster recovery refers to the processes and plans implemented to restore and protect a company’s IT infrastructure during a catastrophe. These catastrophic events can include natural disasters like hurricanes and floods and cyber threats like ransomware attacks or hardware malfunctions.

To prepare for potential disasters, either natural or man-made, start by creating a business continuity plan – essentially a playbook that spells out how to stay in business following a disaster.  Having a plan enables a company to restore operations and communications systematically while helping minimize the risk of severe financial loss and a damaged reputation.

As part of that plan, incorporate the steps needed to safeguard your IT infrastructure from disaster, highlighting clear backup and recovery measures.  First, ensure that data and apps are routinely backed up in a secure, off-site environment, not in the physical office.  For this, the cloud is faster than other options and offers the most protection at the lowest cost.  Next, develop and implement a disaster recovery plan to prevent data loss if the business suffers unexpected downtime.

Developing a Business Continuity Plan

AISN’s Disaster Recovery Checklist helps businesses plan for unexpected downtime. Here are seven steps to include when developing your business continuity plan.

1. Identify the Risks.   List and categorize threats associated with disasters and their impact on various systems.
2. Inventory IT Assets.  Which are most critical to maintaining business continuity?  What’s your tolerance for the loss of those assets?  The response cost should be balanced against your tolerance for system downtime.
3. Define Goals.  If a disaster strikes, how long can your business shut down?  Does it need to be recovered off-site?  Define goals in terms of RPO (Recovery Point Objective, “How much data can we lose?”) and RTO (Recovery Time Objective, “How long can we be down?”).
4. Develop a Plan. Include an “IT Assets Inventory,” data protection procedures and contingency plans, notification/activation schedules, a list of roles and responsibilities, resource requirements, and details about training provisions. A good plan includes maintenance and backup/recovery testing schedules—all delivered on time.
5. Understand the Cloud’s Benefits.  Virtualization technologies make backup and disaster recovery faster, cheaper, and more accessible.
6. Implement the Plan and Get Executive Buy-In.  If executives understand the consequences of system disruptions, you can win their support and funding for contingency policies.
7. Test the Plan.  Testing and keeping plans updated will help ensure business survival.

FACT: Businesses lose billions of dollars yearly due to data loss.

Don’t wait until it’s too late. Prepare your business for today for potential disasters, either natural or man-made. AISN is here to help you with a guided plan with one of our security experts today! Contact us to schedule a call.