Infographic: IT Disaster Recovery Plan

February 2, 2017 Off By David
Object Storage

Technology is the backbone of your business, but what happens when it fails? Make no mistake – this isn’t an "if" scenario, but a matter of time: From power outages to weather events or network issues, technology doesn’t always work as intended. How do you make sure you’re prepared?

Anatomy of a Disaster

What’s behind an IT disaster? The hard truth is that anything can cause network problems, device failures or total blackouts – some issues are simply more likely than others. For example, power outages caused by large-scale events such as storms or fires often top the list of IT disaster causes. Other common origins include issues with existing networks, such as the migration from local stacks to cloud-based networks or attacks by malicious actors. These could include DDoS attacks that are designed to quickly bring down tech services by overwhelming them with network requests or could be the result of employees accidentally or maliciously allowing attackers access to corporate networks.

Inherent Danger

If you’re the victim of a disaster, what next? What’s at risk if systems fail or devices stop working? Your biggest problem is downtime: You could spend hours, days or even weeks without access to critical services such as email, cloud-based applications or back-end software. Next up is data loss: If you’re not regularly backing up your files off site, prolonged loss of power or damage to local servers could mean there’s no way to get your data back – leaving you without the means to conduct day-to-day business. Cost is also a factor: How much revenue are you losing if you’re not able to fill customer orders, respond to questions or complete necessary tasks? Finally, IT disasters may damage public confidence in your company – even if they’re not your fault – leading to reduced revenues and decreased consumer loyalty.

Plan to Fail

How do you deal with disasters? Although you can’t prevent them, you can limit their impact by developing a solid and reliable plan to handle unexpected tech issues. Think of it like an insurance policy – while it’s possible you may not need to activate your disaster recovery plan every year, the costs of not having a plan in place when systems go down or networks go dark far outweigh the amount of time and effort spent developing and testing solid disaster response.

Best bet? Think step by step. Here’s a look at what every company needs to include when building an IT disaster recovery plan.

IT Disaster Recovery Planning from Call One