Everybody understands the importance of having a data recovery plan. Ever since the first records went digital, fear of losing them has been keeping people up nights. So why do some businesses not test their data recovery plans? This lack of testing can really come back to hurt you.
Disaster Recovery Testing
Data backup and recovery should be central to your business continuity plan. In case of a disaster-level event, data recovery is crucial to getting you back up and running quickly. Are you confident that when you restore from backup, everything will work correctly? Doesn’t it make sense to run tests now?
Be Prepared for Disaster Recovery
Prepare your business to deal with unexpected problems by testing your backup solution now. In an interview with Processor magazine, Adrian Sanabria, senior security analyst of 451 Research, gave an example of a common data recovery scenario gone wrong due to the lack of testing.
“It’s no good to switch over to disaster recovery (DR) and find that your Tier 0 application won’t run because the DR environment is three releases behind. If DR will be expected to support a full production load, plan it as such.”
Schedule Regular Disaster Recovery Testing
Run a complete test of your backup systems at least once per quarter, Testing even more frequently can’t hurt.
How Time-Consuming is Data Recovery Testing?
Testing backup systems may sound like a big job, especially if you have multiple departments and locations. One way to make it easier is to spread it out over a few locations at a time.
The surest way to be certain that your business is disaster-proof is to periodically run your entire business off of it. Sanabria tells Processor of a major retail company that tested their data backup systems this way:
They’d actually switch production over to DR once every three months and run the DR environment as production for a full week before switching back. The first few tests were difficult, but the outcome was worth the dedication because they never worry about whether their DR environment will work.
Outsource Your BDR
Testing a company’s backup solution is time-consuming, but if a business understands the value of data security, it has to get done. Does regular recovery testing seem like one more thing to take your time and energy away from making money? Why not outsource it to Quikteks?
We offer businesses of all sizes a comprehensive Backup and Disaster Recovery (BDR) solution. Our solution is faster compared to the more traditional tape backup systems, which could take as much as 40 hours. Our BDR takes about an hour to restore and thoroughly test the integrity of the backed up data.
BDR is the most secure way to backup and recover your company’s data. As part of Quiktek’s BDR solution, we not only monitor and oversee the entire data backup and recovery process, but test regularly. If disaster strikes, you know that your business data is safe and operations will be up and running again quickly.
Call us at (973) 882-4644 to learn more about BDR. We can help.