Any business, enterprise network and data access can all be knocked out without you even knowing. This could really lead your business to a disaster as you can't stop them all from happening but if you have a good disaster recovery plan then you will be better prepared for the unexpected.
Some of the main disasters you could encounter are: Hurricanes, Earthquakes, Fires, Floods, Terrorist Attacks and Cyberattacks, the likelihood of these happening will vary from unlikely to highly possible.
However, a disaster could be as simple as the internet going down or even being locked out of your building, these may appear minor or a nuisance at first thought, but they are still highly probable disasters, are you prepared for them and can you minimise their impact?
Even if you have a Disaster Recovery Plan, when was it last updated and tested. Have your technologies and services been updated to make it easier to recover from a disaster. Here are 7 points that should be included in a Disaster Recovery Plan:
An Analysis of All Potential Threats and Possible Reactions to Them
Taking into account the full spectrum of "potential interrupters" to your business. Having different scenarios written out can help with the resolution part of how you would solve it if that scenario happened.
A Business Impact Analysis (BIA)
A BIA identifies and evaluates the potential effects (financial, life/safety, regulatory, legal/contractual, reputation etc..) Having and completing a BIA for all major IT systems will allow for the identification of system priorities and dependencies.
The BIA examines three security objectives: confidentiality, integrity and availability.
People
Don’t make the mistake of focusing your Disaster Recovery Plan on technology remember to focus on your people and processes too. Ask yourselves some questions to help apply your disaster recovery plan to your whole organisation: What behaviours will you need from your user community? What do they need to get up and running again after a disaster?
If your business has a disaster then you will have these few points already planned out:
- Having critical people in charge of responding to the crisis.
- Having a phone number and email to send for help if needed
- Making it clear who would be sent into work if a disaster happened.
- Who will speak for the company to the victims, clients, and employees.
Updates
Another mistake you should avoid is forgetting to update your disaster recovery plan when changes are made to internal systems. Always take into account all the technologies and applications that you use.
Priorities
Identify: "What is important?"
"Not everything in a business needs saving/protected
Only personal and proprietary information needs saving. Any information what would be for public release is not as important.
Regular Practice Drills
Every Disaster Recovery Plan needs to be tested so that people can practice the procedure and know what they would do in a real life situation. A Disaster Recovery Plan isn't very effective if it is not tested.
A Consideration of Disaster Recovery as a Service (DRaaS)
The Cloud has helped disaster Recovery grow as a service by moving data operations into the cloud. On-Demand services have made Disaster Recovery easier and economical and so organisation are now better prepared for disasters.
DO NOT WAIT for a cyberattack to hit as resolving this without a properly structured plan will hit your business harder. Always have a plan in place so you know exactly what to do when an attack does hit your business will be able to get back to work more quickly than without a plan.
