Disaster Recovery

What Is Disaster Recovery?

Today we will learn about Disaster Recovery. Zombie Apocalypse. Random meteor collision. Electromagnetic pulses from the Sun. Or maybe just a crashed hard drive with no backup. But don’t forget about the volcano. Or a vampire! These are examples of things that could potentially disrupt the normal flow of your business. Some of these instances are less likely than others (I mean who doesn’t back up their hard drive these days?). But the most likely cause of the business disaster can be the least anticipated event.

What is disaster recovery?

Disaster recovery is the planning and implementation of restoring mission-critical business functions after any type of disaster. Zombies aside, what if your data center actually caught fire and was destroyed? How long before you can restore service to your customers, and do you have a plan for even the worst-case scenario?

If 2020 has taught us anything, it’s that we should expect the unexpected. An accident happens. Obviously, epidemics are also occurring, which loosely translates into a slow disaster recovery scenario worldwide; Many businesses and unprecedented circumstances had to figure out how to continue providing services. This is the basic concept behind disaster recovery.

Hope for the better, plan for the worst

Although it is rarely (if ever) stated publicly, all large businesses have disaster recovery plans. Typically, these plans include:

  • Multiple (daily/weekly/monthly) data backups are physically stored in completely separate geographical locations.
  • Third-party data centers or colocation spaces (typically at least several hundred miles away from their main business location), contain the necessary hardware to restore mission-critical business operations from aforementioned backups in the event of a disaster.
  • Clearly identified team members will be dispatched to off-site locations with the knowledge and skills to restore all mission-critical business functions in the shortest possible time.

These businesses will periodically run actual disaster recovery drills, sending team members to designated data centers with only their data backups. The team then attempts to fully restore all business operations within a controlled environment, effectively creating a micro version of their company’s entire data infrastructure. This is the only way to know for sure that the business can actually recover in the event of a catastrophic event.

Why does disaster recovery matter?

Fundamentally, the value of a disaster recovery plan is equal to the value of your data and the ability to restore business operations after any catastrophic event. For small businesses, an event of this nature may not be something where you put, say, family or other matters before business. However, that’s not to say there’s nothing to learn from the way big businesses handle emergencies.

If you’re not currently maintaining backups of your important data, you really should start immediately. External hard drives are very reasonably priced these days, around $ 100 USD for a 4TB capacity. Don’t just trust “the cloud”, always maintain your own physical backup of any important data. An ounce of prevention is always worth a pound of cure; Keep your data and your business safe. Consider your own disaster recovery plan today. As always, please let us know if you have any feedback or comments. We are here to help in the best possible way. You can find us on Discord, the cPanel Forums, and Reddit.