You’ve invested in a BDR (Backup and Disaster Recovery) and now sleep more soundly at night, but the hardware itself is really only part of the solution. You want to ensure your provider does preventative maintenance, periodic testing, multi-location storage, and staff training. Having these things in place will help avoid downtime if the worst happens.
Preventative Maintenance: In addition to the hardware itself, a solid backup solution also has its own backup including generators, backup batteries, cooling systems, fire detection, suppression systems, and redundant cloud storage. You can’t necessarily head to your provider’s office to see for yourself, but you can read the fine print on your contracts as well as have meaningful conversations with potential providers.
Periodic Testing: Consistently ensuring everything is running as it should will allow you some peace of mind as well as lay the groundwork for successful backup. This goes beyond simply testing backup software or cloud storage. A good backup provider will run regular testing and provide reports on the health of the backup, size, and any glitches that you might be facing. This testing should also include 24/7 monitoring and alerting of any potential issues including cyberthreats or outages.
Multi-Location Storage: Regardless of how safe a location may seem, data needs to be stored in more than one location. Think about it; if the backup server for your company is sitting in a location that sees seasonal hurricanes or is located on top of an active earthquake fault, your data is still in danger. It’s about backing up your backup.
Team Training: Don’t leave it all to your IT company. When it comes to backup, security, and other breaches, employees truly are the weakest links. Cybercriminals are going after these individuals rather than attacking at a network level because they are easier to infiltrate. Make sure you have regular cybersecurity training in place for all employees to limit these potential breaches. Creating a strong disaster recovery plan is not all about the recovery part, prevention is equally important too.