An effective and workable backup and recovery strategy and related
disciplines, are crucial to the successful recovery of Business'
operation, should there be a catastrophic failure. The correct and
robust backups of computer operating systems and data will
minimise downtime and expedite recovery in the event of a
compromised system.A compromised system can result from any
of the following:
-
A power loss.
-
A computer system hardware failure.
- A “Natural
Disaster” (i.e. Earthquake, Flood, etc.) or other
physical threat (i.e. Fire, Water, etc.). - Corruption or deletion
of data and/or operating system
programs caused by exposure to malicious software
(Virus, Worm, Trojan etc.). - Corruption or deletion of data and/or operating system programs caused by an unauthorized internal or external intruder (i.e. a hacker or theft).
- Accidental corruption or deletion of data..
- Backup copies of the Operating System and Application software loaded on servers must be stored off-site under triple-layer protection (i.e. the storage media is stored in a locked container; in a locked room; in a locked building; OR stored in a fire safe; in a locked room).
- Backups must be tested and verified on a regular basis that a complete recovery of the data and/or computer system can be performed (in an isolated environment).
- Backup retention periods must meet industry specific regulatory requirements.
- Backup and recovery procedures will be documented for all servers and computer systems that are required to implement backup and recovery systems.
- Backups must
be performed before and after applying software upgrades, patches,
hot-fixes and service packs. Upgrades must be carefully reviewed to
ensure previous backup data will be compatible with the new software.
Backup and Recovery Manages Services provided by PPR Solutions
Business Continuity
Planning (BCP)
PPR works with you in the planning process to identify the critical
functions and developscontingency arrangements and procedures that will
enable your business to respond to a business interruption in a timely
and efficient manner. The aim is to ensure critical business functions
can be continued and to facilitate prompt return to normal operations.
Disaster Recovery Planning (DRP)
This is a separate but closely related process to Business Continuity
Planning. PPR works with you to develop the required plans which need
to be developed, maintained and tested to ensure the recovery of IT
systems to an alternate site in the event of a catastrophic failure
at a production data centre.
Recovery Time Objective (RTO)
The period of time within which systems, applications and functions
must be recovered after an outage. The RTO must include the time to
make the decision to invoke Disaster Recovery procedures and the execute
the technical recovery and business verification checks.
Recovery Point Objective (RPO)
The point in time to which systems and data must be recovered after
an outage. This is usually to the most recent available backup. Effectively
it identifies the maximum amount of data loss the business could live
with if a disaster situation occurs.
Business
Impact Analysis (BIA)
The analysis of business functions to determine the impact of a
service outage
on that function. The impact may be financial, reputational, regulatory,
legal or
operational. The BIA is used to determine the Disaster Recovery category
of
the supporting systems as well as the RTO and RPO.
“That two out of five enterprises that experience a disaster will go out of business within five years of the event”
Gartner
Inc. "Preparing for Disaster:
Affordable SMB Actions - March
6, 2002
