Disasters affecting IT systems and data represent a significant threat to every organisation. A system crash, power outage, cyber attack, natural disaster or user error can have far reaching consequences, especially for SMBs. What can be considered a disaster depends on the business, but it generally covers any situation resulting in an unacceptable loss of data or productivity.
Many businesses underestimate the length and cost of experiencing a severe outage, which can run into the tens of thousands. While businesses can’t always prevent disasters from occurring, they can limit the damage caused. Disaster recovery plans and technology can enable instant recovery of data, applications and systems.
Common Threats
The first step to creating a disaster recovery plan is to conduct a risk assessment to determine the biggest threats. For SMBs, this includes things like:
- Hardware Failure – Even with multiple power supplies, network controllers and hard drives, an unforeseen event can still result in a widespread power outage, leading to downtime and potential data loss.
- Software Failure – A lack of patch testing and updates can lead to the corruption of applications, which can then halt entire systems. Other sources of software failure include out-dated operating systems, viruses and malware.
- Natural Disaster – Disasters such as storms, earthquakes, fires and other weather related incidents account for a relatively small number of IT disasters. When they do occur however, the impact can be devastating, resulting in major infrastructure damage and data loss.
- Human Error – Errors by staff are usually not as serious as the examples above. But mistakes like accidentally wiping a file system on a server can have severe consequences and can be made by anyone, from executives to newer, inexperienced staff. A disaster recovery system is crucial to mitigate this risk, regardless of who is in control.
Once a business recognises potential sources of disaster and system outage, they should implement a management system and a customised data backup and recovery solution to minimise the resulting damage.
Disaster Recovery Solutions
Disaster recovery solutions include traditional tape and disk backup as well as cloud backup. The first option is becoming much less common as a preferred method due to its drawbacks, including its expensiveness, complexity and inability to recover applications and systems efficiently.
A good disaster recovery solution is about enabling business continuity and minimising the impact of extended periods of downtime. Cloud backup makes data backup and recovery quicker and more convenient. But keep in mind that cloud-based systems are still prone to failure, meaning a multi-cloud approach is a more secure option for disaster prevention and data recovery
ITConnexion Data Backup and Recovery Services
ITConnexion is a Melbourne based IT services company who can protect your organisation’s data from disaster with our comprehensive data backup and recovery services. We’ll build a solution and recovery plan that is ideal for your organisation. Contact our team today to find out more.
