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Remember the 3-2-1 data backup rule? It states that it's a best practice to replicate at least three copies of data stored on two different media, with at least one copy off-site or off-premise. IT professionals often use an additional step; the backup rule is now 3-2-1-1. That extra “1” accounts for an air-gapped copy of your data.

With major hacks, hurricanes and other disasters hitting the news lately, disaster recovery planning has become a necessity for every IT organization. We've talked a lot about how to handle a disaster and developing a disaster recovery (DR) plan, but let's take a deeper dive into actually putting a plan into motion.

The 2019 Atlantic hurricane season is quickly approaching, beginning on June 1^st and lasting through the end of November. AccuWeather predicts up to 14 tropical storms, of which seven storms could have the potential to develop to hurricane strength. The devastation from these storms is staggering; storms such as Hurricane Sandy in the Northeast, Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico and the Caribbean, and Hurricane Harvey in the Southeast and Gulf regions have caused over $260 billion worth of damage between them within the past ten years.

One of the most important things for any business is to ensure the continuity of operations in the event of a disaster. As more companies are investing in disaster recovery techniques, they are becoming overly complacent without implementing a proper test.

Implementing a disaster recovery plan can often be a daunting task. When it comes to ensuring the security and continuity of your business’s data, there are a lot of factors for companies to consider. Everything, from identifying risk areas to choosing a location to host the disaster recovery site, takes time money and resources that many companies do not have.

Cloud DR (disaster recovery), also known as DRaaS (Disaster Recovery as a Service) puts a twist on traditional DR practices so that organizations can achieve greater cost savings while also achieving more security and reliability in the wake of disaster. Traditional site-to-site data replication has inherent expenses that cloud DR solutions bypass, including the upfront costs of building out a geographically redundant data repository some 500 miles away.  

What would happen if your office burned down? If there was a flood? If your data was compromised by ransomware? Would your data survive? Could your company recover? Do you have a plan? CIOs are asked these questions every day and, often, these questions keep them up at night. Knowing that your company is protected in the event of a disaster is priceless. Especially when we know that a majority of companies that do not have disaster recovery plans will be put out of business when disaster strikes. Other than the obvious benefits of peace of mind and business continuity, having a disaster recovery plan in place will help your business immensely. Here are 5 ways that DR planning can benefit your business:

Risk assessing is the process of identifying potential risks that could harm an organization. A risk assessment template helps you identify the hazards that could negatively impact your business and the extent of that negative impact. Correctly identifying the risks your business could face could help reduce the severity of any potentially damaging event.

Making decisions about business continuity (BC) and disaster recovery (DR) can be a CIO’s worst nightmare. Planning, implementing and testing a strategy can take months and sleepless nights. Additionally, some CIOs face the added struggle of small budgets, fewer resources, and a mandate for agility to remain competitive. Add them all up, and you get an extremely difficult task task.

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