Tag Archives: backup disaster recovery

Backup Disaster Recovery (BDR) Plan: Preparing For The Worst

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Backup Disaster Recovery (BDR) Plan concept with laptop on water

Be prepared and you can weather the storm

Recently, multiple sudden natural disasters have left millions of people stranded on roadways, stranded at work, or left in their homes and unable to leave, and without electricity, All of these sudden floods, thunderstorms, hurricanes, etc. should all serve as a reminder that we have to be ready at all times just in case a disaster does strike. Today’s weather is completely unpredictable, and with the winter season approaching, there are sure to be more unpredictable weather on the way.
Regardless of where your business is located, it is always important to have a full Backup Disaster Recovery(BDR) plan in place. If you have an effective BDR in place, you will be able to effectively respond to any type of disaster that takes place. Whether you currently have a Backup Disaster Recovery(BDR) plan in place or not, we encourage you to ask yourself these questions:
What would your business do if you ever lost access to data?
How long do you think it would take for your business to recover from a major loss?
If you no longer had access to your server, would your business be able to survive?
How much do you think it would cost to recover from the loss?
Many businesses do have a backup solution ready just in case a disaster happens, but not every business will be able to recover quickly when something does happen. If your business loses data or if there is a power outage, it can be difficult for some businesses to restart their operations quickly. For some businesses, the entire operations can be shut down if there is no access to the server for less than two days.
When creating a Backup Disaster Recovery plan, it is very important that you start by making preparations for the worst possible thing that can happen. When you start by preparing for the absolute worse, you should have an easier time resolving the issue when something minor occurs.
Are you making plans to have a telecommuting plan in place just in case your employees will need to access business data from a different location? When your employees who have access to the data can obtain the information when needed, this will keep your business from losing revenue. Your employees will be able to access vital business information from their new location until they can gain access to the workplace again.
When your employees are able to use file sync services and cloud services, all employees will be able to do their jobs despite the disaster that took place. The use of these services and technologies can be the difference between losing revenue and bringing in revenue. When employees are equipped with the services they need while they are working from home or another location, they will be motivated and prepared to get their work done every day, regardless of where they are working from.
A BDR plan can save your business from completely losing everything and closing its doors for good. When you back up your data in off-site locations and other locations, you will have your business operating again in little time. You may also be able to run your business from another location.
Do you think it is time to rethink and reevaluate your current BDR plans? Are you ready to develop a Backup Disaster Recovery plan that will allow your business to continue operating despite what type of natural disaster or accident takes place? For more information on backup and disaster recovery plans, please do not hesitate to contact us today for more information. Our team is here to help your business plan for any unforeseen events.

The Depths of Your Disaster Recovery Plan

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Disaster Recovery Plan shown on a dart board next to a laptop

Disaster Recovery Plan is key to your business success.

Data disaster recovery is something that every business should be prepared for. Even if your company is never attacked by a hacker or has to face a ransomware system-wipe, it’s important to have a plan in case of pure technical failures and mistakes.  You, at the very least, want version backed up version control for your central systems so that a new employee can’t lose a client’s information by accidentally zeroing the values. The ability to retrieve active data from a day or a week ago is undeniably useful. Of course, backing up your CRM and financial data on a weekly basis is only scratching the surface your disaster recovery depth potential. In an ideal recovery, you would be able to completely factory-reset every computer and device on the company network and reinstall your infrastructure, programs, and data all from a single comprehensive backup kept on the cloud so that local disasters can’t reach it.

Of course, the most practical way to store your backups is based on how frequently they’ll need to be updated or accessed. Things like your operating systems, system configurations, and program installations will only need to be changed when your IT team changes the infrastructure. Then there are big databases including things like client information and inventory that will be accessed and updated all the time. These should have at least recent version control recovery available along with a few periodic older backups. Finally, there are the items you want incredibly tight control over and track every single change along with who made it.

Surface Changes

Active projects, customer service conversation, and anything having to do with money needs to be tracked much more closely than normal backup procedures account for. This is where finely tuned version control comes in. Whether it’s for security or simple collaborative convenience, the most surface-level form of backup are fast-paced changes, sometimes hundreds a day, and often it’s as important to know who made a change as the change itself. These detailed ‘saves’ of your data can be finalized at, say, midnight every night and archived after a week or two.

Document Management Software

While it’s true that digital documents like forms and contracts are technically data, there is a functional difference between your business data and your online documents. For these, you want a high-quality document management system or DMS for short. While your best bet is a system made specifically for the needs of your industry, Google Docs is a good example of a basic DMS. More specialized versions will have faster and more convenient mobile and online access, sorting, permissions, and even digital signature authorization for quick and easy approvals between clients and business partners.

Database Backups

The most standard form of backup is the sort that is taken on schedule, archived on schedule, and almost never thought about. For most people, this is their favorite kind of backup because it can take care of itself with a simple automated program directed at the files you want saved. The easiest thing to back up are databases like the sort that hold customer login data, account information, sales histories, department budget reports, and so on. With an easy to set up backup system, you can allow each authorized employee to designate the files they’d like backed up regularly every night, week, or month.

The purpose of these backups is the core of your restoration plan. In theory, as long as you have your databases and active files backed up, you will be able to restore your business data infrastructure from a complete reinstall of all your enterprise management software on new or factory reset computers with a minimal amount of lost data.

The Deep Infrastructure Backup

Every time you think you have a complete recovery backup plan, remember that technology and achievement rely on innovation. Ask yourself how it could be better, how recovery could be faster, and how you can ensure that no data is lost or damaged in the recovery. One important answer to this question is an infrastructure backup. Normal backups assume that you may have to reinstall your operating system and programs but that’s okay, right? After all, these should all be readily available to you. The problems is if you had special configuration settings to make your settings or automations run correctly, these are harder to get back into place in a timely manner and there’s a possibility your IT team doesn’t have notes on all the changes that will need to be made.

A neat trick to ensure that your recovery is fast and efficient is to do a periodic deep backup of any system that has custom settings or that you want to be brought back online quickly in order to get your employees back in the saddle even before the full recovery is complete. Besides your central systems and network setup, if you have large sets of computers that all run the same setup like customer service workstations, you can take a single backup and restore all the endpoints from there. Just make sure you update your deep backups every time the infrastructure or configurations change.

Recovering After a Disaster

The best thing about having a truly comprehensive backup and recovery plan is that you can theoretically recover every important system in the company quick enough to get your employees back online and your business humming again within hours of a disaster or setup afterward. Ransomware, for instance, that infects your entire network can be effectively eradicated with a full factory reset and a reinstall from the deep backup to the databases right up to the most recent surface changes. For more advice and news on backups and recovery, contact us today!

What Are Your Backup And Disaster Recovery (BDR) Plans For Hurricane Season?

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Severe storm in the forecast, time to confirm your plan is up to date.

Would you say your business is fully prepared for this year’s stormy weather? We believe this year’s hurricane season will be busier than it has been in a while. There have already been indications that there will be at least two major hurricanes during this year’s hurricane season. We know the numbers are only based on data, but we should always remember how many businesses have been severely damaged by hurricanes.

Hurricanes can cause millions and billions of dollars worth of damage. If your business was hit by a major hurricane, do you think you will be able to fully recover from it? Do you think you will be able to recover your business’s important data and systems? If you are unsure, you should strongly consider taking action right away so your business will be prepared in case there is a major disaster.

What Is Your Current Backup And Disaster Recovery Strategy?

Unfortunately, many businesses do not pay much attention to their current backup and disaster recovery strategy. A backup strategy is taken for granted by many businesses. Your business has to make sure that all your important files are backed up. Your business should also make sure that all the files can be recovered, even if your on-premise equipment has been damaged or completely destroyed.

Your business should also be able to verify that your backups can be recovered by the method you have chosen. When your business uses 24/7 backup monitoring, you will always know that your backups can be recovered. You will also feel comfortable knowing that your backups will also be stable.

Website Downtime

Did you know that your business’s network image can be stored? When an image of your network is stored, you will be able to pick up where you left off. You will not have to wait until your applications and software are re-installed and running successfully. You will be given screenshots that can confirm your systems and applications are working as they should be.

We know that the summertime is supposed to be a time of fun for many people. However, the summer can bring some horrible and disastrous weather. In case bad weather strikes your workplace, you want to be fully prepared for anything and everything. It is important that you are proactive as you can be during the summer. You should have a complete list of solutions so your team, customers, clients, etc. will not be left in the dark.

You can create a backup and disaster recovery plan that works the way you need it to. Your business is unique, and you need a BDR strategy that will fit the needs of your business. Do not hesitate to contact us today for more information on backup and disaster recovery plans, consulting, etc.

Have A Plan During The Summer

When you have a plan, this can be the major difference between having your business up and running hours, days, weeks, months, or years later. When you are proactive, you will be able to anticipate any situation that may come along with a disaster. When you are prepared to take the right steps, everyone in the workplace will be prepared for the worst situations, and no one will miss a single beat.

You have to anticipate everything that can arise, which means you will have to think beyond having your computers destroyed or your computers being offline for hours. Do you have an evacuation plan? Will there be a set location for your team to meet? Will your team be able to work from home until it is safe to enter the workplace again?

Backup Disaster Recovery and Proactive Workplace Strategies

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20170504

Is your business as secure as it could be?

Nowadays, are enough businesses as secure as they could be? After all, even though many businesses do invest in protection and cybersecurity, they might not update it as regularly as they could. On the other hand, you also have companies who are too laid back and assume their business isn’t susceptible to threats. This is especially true when it comes to small businesses, who are often a much easier target for cybercriminals.

With that said, this is why you need to keep your business secure, and use risk management in the process as well. By definition, risk management is defined as the process of identifying, assessing and controlling threats to an organization’s capital and earnings. With that said, one of the biggest reasons that you need to remain secure in the workplace, is because threats can be very unpredictable. Even more so, it’s time to start taking a proactive approach in dealing with threats, as opposed to a reactive approach. If you’re not familiar with these terms, it’s time to look a little more into what they mean. On top of that, we’ll also look at one of the best proactive workplace strategies out there.

The Difference Between the Two

First of all, what is the major difference between proactive and reactive? For the former, you’re preparing for threats and taking action before anything even happens. With a reactive approach, on the other hand, you don’t take action until after a threat occurs. The latter is why so many businesses have their data compromised regularly. As a common business practice, you need to actively work toward taking action even before something occurs. With that said, here are some of the best proactive workplace strategies.

#1. Backup Disaster Recovery

One of the best proactive approaches to securing your business, is through backing up your data on a regular basis. Aside from using a USB flash drive, always make sure to invest in cloud computing as well. A storing method that backs up all data over the Internet, you don’t have to worry about the data on your hard drive. Besides, all your data is stored virtually. Not to mention you can access this virtual data via any device with an Internet connection.

By storing your data on a regular basis, you’re actively preparing for any incidents that could occur. Speaking of which, cloud computing is also important, because it’s a great backup disaster recovery method. As an example, let’s say that your computer became infected with ransomware or any virus which threatens your sensitive info. Despite the threat of losing all files on your hard drive, recovering all your data would still be a cinch. Just access a non-infected device, and open your virtual files from there. Having all files erased on your hard drive, means nothing if there are copies stored elsewhere. This is why a proactive approach is important, if a business owner was reactive in these situations, they would wait until they were infected before taking any action.

#2. Anti-Virus Software

Anti-virus software is also a proactive approach to dealing with threats and incidents in the workplace. Though complex in nature, how the software operates is as basic as it comes, easily neutralizing any threat that infects your computer. On top of that, anti-virus programs are also actively involved while you’re surfing the web, even giving you warnings about which websites are dangerous. McAfee has a feature that tells you turn back if you visit an unsuspecting website, and Kaspersky monitors the search results of each web browser. The safe websites are marked in green, and the dangerous sites have a red notification.

#3. Educating Your Employees

Considering that being proactive means that you’re actively involved in making sure threats are neutralized, it would also make sense that you educate your employees. That way, you’re keeping the business even more secure. It’s one thing if a business owner is preventing threats before they happen, which is definitely important. However, imagine the possibilities of every employee working from different angles to ensure the business is completely secure. It’s not just enough that you educate them, either, but make sure they are actively taking action.

Between backing up your data, the use of anti-virus software, and educating your employees, these are some useful tips that will lead to your business being more proactive. Don’t wait for the threats to come to come, but be prepared at all times.

For more information about backup disaster recovery, as well as other useful proactive workplace strategies in the workplace, feel free to contact us today at SystemsNet. We look forward to hearing from you, and assisting you in the best way possible.