BetterWorld Mission Critical Guide Series, Part 1: Backup and Disaster Recovery as a Service

Why Having a Backup and Disaster Recovery Service in Place is Vital

Losing data can put your employee, customer, partner, investor, and all stakeholder’s data at risk as well as your mission critical data that runs your organization. It can also have a significant impact on your credibility and finances as the average cost of a breach is $7M. It is estimated that 60% of companies that experience data loss close within six months.

Alternatively, you could be at risk of losing data permanently. Viruses and malware that attack your hardware can destroy it, but these are just some of the most dominant threats. Studies show that 45% of all unplanned downtime is caused by hardware failures, while 60% of IT professionals say that careless employees are the most significant risk to their data.

Even if your organization manages to survive a data loss, it could be costly. Research shows that, on average, companies pay $7M to recover from a data loss. Many companies do not have that kind of money to spare. These expenses, as high as they are, only tell part of the story.

The other price may be something irreplaceable; the faith and trust of your customers and stakeholders. If they feel their data is not safe with you, they will take their business elsewhere. The solution is to create and implement a data backup strategy. With the right tools, planning, and training, you can protect your data.

Planning a Backup and DR Strategy

Backups, restores, and data recovery operations are some of the most important tasks an IT organization performs. Businesses cannot risk losing access to data for any significant amount of time; therefore, the organization should develop and follow a detailed plan.

An all-encompassing, master backup strategy can be difficult to apply consistently due to differences in staffing and technologies that typically exist from one business unit to another throughout an organization. It may be valuable to develop individual strategies for various business units or user groups, depending on application usage.