| Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity are two | | | | dollars each year, therefore guidelines about disaster |
| different processes but commonly combined together | | | | recovery planning must be developed to assist in the |
| into a single management framework – a Business | | | | identification and prevention of potential risks which |
| Continuity and Disaster Recovery Planning. Business | | | | may impact the business. |
| Continuity and Disaster Recovery Planning provides a | | | | Business continuity and disaster recovery planning |
| framework for the recovery of business function after | | | | provides a framework for the recovery of your IT |
| a disaster. | | | | infrastructure from any kinds of specific disaster both |
| In developing a Business Continuity and Disaster | | | | large and small in scale. A Disaster Recovery planning |
| Recovery Planning firstly we need to understand the | | | | assists in providing a pre-defined and co-ordinate list of |
| different between the Disaster Recovery (DR) and | | | | steps for the minimization of the overall effects of a |
| Business Continuity (BC). The different between | | | | disaster and recovery from a disaster. During or |
| Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity can be | | | | following a disaster, a Disaster Recovery planning aids |
| described with the following scenario. | | | | in avoiding confusion to ensure a swift recovery to a |
| In an incident where the fire sweeps the server room | | | | stable level of business continuity operations. |
| where all the servers reside, destroying everything in it | | | | Preventive Strategy |
| including all the servers and the entire supporting | | | | In your business continuity and disaster recovery |
| infrastructure, the network routers, the LAN Switches, | | | | planning should manage the Preventive Strategies |
| the network cabling and everything – nothing left. In | | | | which includes the methods that should be taken to |
| the documentation of your business continuity and | | | | avoid a potential disaster from happening. |
| disaster recovery planning, you will take some Disaster | | | | Such measures are crucial to the mitigation of the risk |
| Recovery and Business Continuity processes. | | | | and are usually implemented upon the identification of a |
| Disaster Recovery (DR) example: | | | | potential risk. Examples of preventative strategies |
| To restore the data (thanks to your daily backup | | | | include: |
| strategy) to alternate servers in an alternate site, you | | | | • Daily backup and Data backup in a weekly or |
| need to do the recovery to a basic operational level. | | | | monthly basis should be taken stored off site. • |
| This will allow the users to continue working | | | | Properly and well managed firewalls will protect from |
| immediately after the restoration completed and the | | | | potential hacking or any types of network security |
| system is available again. This is the DR part of your | | | | threats. |
| business continuity and disaster recovery planning | | | | • Anti-virus software deployed to all the servers |
| processes. | | | | and computers to protect the virus outbreaks |
| Business Continuity (BC) Example: | | | | • Two redundant Internet connections being |
| In an effort to invoke the full Business Continuity plan | | | | terminated into two different exchanges to avoid loss |
| for this fire disaster, you would do the following steps: | | | | of Internet connectivity. |
| • Purchasing new server units including the | | | | Recovery |
| supported equipments including Switches, Routers | | | | In your business continuity and disaster recovery |
| network, and other networking infrastructures | | | | planning, recovery strategies should include the steps t |
| • Rebuilding the physical server rooms and other | | | | taken when a disaster occurs. The executions of the |
| facilities such as network cabling, server racks with a | | | | steps should be swift to avoid the prolonged |
| new and much better design including the easy to | | | | timeframes in an acceptable level of operation. The |
| reach fire extinguisher placement and other things to | | | | following are examples of recovery strategies: |
| comply with the HSE. | | | | • Performing a regular data restore test from the |
| • Long hard works of migrating the current data | | | | tapes should be done to make sure that data |
| and users management to new system | | | | restoration will work perfectly in case of disaster. |
| We see now the different between the disaster | | | | • Managing the alternate server room with |
| recovery and business continuity which all should be | | | | acceptable standby backup servers in the event of |
| managed within your Business Continuity and Disaster | | | | the main server rooms facilities destroyed. Particularly |
| Recovery Planning. | | | | the domain servers and or DNS server which are |
| Business Continuity Disaster Recovery Planning | | | | critical to the operation of the system |
| Every organization should manage the information | | | | • Spare server in an alternative location for the |
| system infrastructure and protect against any potential | | | | restoration of the data in the event of the main file and |
| threats, and should also manage the disaster recovery | | | | print servers failing. |
| and business continuity planning against any damage or | | | | Being prepared for a disaster is much better before |
| loss in the event of a disaster. Threats to IT | | | | the disaster destroy everything. |
| infrastructure are real and costs companies millions of | | | | |