Disaster Recovery: Preparing For The Unexpected
How will your IT stack fare if disaster strikes?
It will come as no surprise when I say that we live in an increasingly perilous world. Fraud, cybercrime and natural disasters are all on the rise, and businesses must use all available means to safeguard IT infrastructure and data. Yet merely running data backups is just one of many steps you should take to ensure business continuity in the face of calamity. Title agencies should also strongly consider a disaster recovery plan. Although it’s no silver bullet, creating a comprehensive plan allows you to rest easier if a worst-case scenario arrives. Let’s look at what it entails.
Disaster recovery versus incident response
First, what is disaster recovery and how does it differ from something like incident response? While both are designed to respond to IT disruption, there are crucial differences between the two processes:
- Scope: Disaster recovery plans typically deal with larger and more systemic IT problems than those addressed by incident response. They tackle major issues like full-scale IT restoration in the event of major catastrophes like floods, hardware failures or cyberattacks. Incident response, on the other hand, is geared toward dealing with individual IT incidents on a one-off or as-needed basis.
- Time span and focuses: Disaster recovery plans are more concerned with longer-term recovery processes than incident response. Think days or weeks versus minutes or hours. The two processes also have different focuses. Incident response is preoccupied with swift remediation of IT incidents, while disaster recovery can include data backups, ensuring continuity and even establishing alternative work sites.
The core principles of disaster recovery
Now that we’ve explored what disaster recovery is, let’s look at what goes into building a plan that ensures continuity, prevents lasting damage and accelerates system restoration. A comprehensive plan should include the following pillars:
- Introduction: Sketch out your goals for disaster recovery and the objectives you will need to hit to support each goal.
- Business Analysis: Next, detail your agency’s threats and vulnerabilities, as well as their potential business impact.
- Recovery Processes: Include step-by-step instructions for how systems will be restored. Include who needs to be involved in these activities, as well as their roles and responsibilities.
- Data Recovery: List out all organizational policies regarding the recovery of mission critical data. These steps should involve backup procedures, in addition to off-site storage locations.
- Alternative Worksites and Communication Plans: Outline how your team will continue to function in the event of having to abandon your typical worksite. Include information about alternative work locations and communication methods.
- Testing and Compliance: Determine how you will test your plan prior to a disaster taking place. Ensure that all policies are compliant with relevant industry regulations.
Implementing your plan
Once you finalize your disaster recovery plan, don’t let it gather dust. Gain necessary reviews and approvals. Distribute the plan to relevant personnel and store it in an accessible location. Conduct training on specific software and data practices, and finally, test for flaws and iterate for continuous improvement.
Protect your IT suite through thick and thin
Creating a strong disaster recovery plan can take a bit of work up-front, but it pays off big time in a worst-case scenario. More comprehensive than incidence response, disaster recovery includes steps for restoring systems and maintaining business continuity even during a catastrophic event. While nothing can fully eliminate IT risk, disaster recovery plans can help your firm roll with the punches of today’s threat landscape and keep moving forward.