Disaster Recovery Journal

Monday 18th March saw the official launch of the Good Practice Guidelines (GPG) 2013, the independent body of knowledge for good Business Continuity (BC) practice worldwide.  

The launch of GPG 2013 signifies a memorable event for BC professionals all around the world and marks a key milestone for the Business Continuity Institute (BCI).  Its release has met with great enthusiasm and has been applauded around the globe as a key tool in achieving organizational resilience.

The most distinct benefit of cloud computing is its inherent cost effectiveness. However, the cloud offers another advantage that is not so pronounced: disaster recovery.

Traditional hosting plans offer several options for a variety of disaster recovery needs, but these options still pale in comparison to those offered through cloud hosting. Since the physical servers are located in a very secure data center, information is kept safe—even during natural disasters such as hurricanes and earthquakes.

Hot on the heels of the success of Spring World 2013, DRJ has announced the dates and location for its industry leading fall conference: Fall World 2013.

Fall World 2013 will be in San Diego, California from Sept. 22 - 25 at the Hilton San Diego Bayfront.

My  topic of choice for today’s webinar listen-into was the one on Cyber Threats and Cyber Security by Brendan Byrne from IBM in which Brendan shared both IBM’s and other organizations experiences from the dark world of cyber threat.

According to a recent IBM survey, the biggest threat perceived by Business Continuity professionals is cyber-security.  Some of the challenges faced include BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) which is on the increase; the widespread use of social media with its pros and cons; workforce mobility and the increasing use of cloud-based solutions.

The relocation of your company’s technical infrastructure to the cloud may appear to be a frightening one—every aspect of your technology will need to be adjusted to appropriately reflect its new location. However, there is good news: according to a recent article in CIO, more than half of businesses are moving their capabilities to the cloud, and the majority of these companies are noticing increased profit.

One of the core reasons cloud solutions save customers money is because companies no longer need to utilize resources such as manpower (and the salary to fuel this manpower) to keep their infrastructure running. A cloud server will practically run itself, since there is no complex architecture to maintain.

If you are new to the cloud hosting industry, you may be slightly confused by the variety of options available regarding cloud storage. You may keep hearing the term “cloud computing” and not quite understanding what it means. You may not even be sure if the cloud is just hype. Choosing a cloud hosting provider can be difficult, but with just a few tips, you will be fast on your way to your new host.

Today marks a rather somber anniversary - the anniversary of the earthquake and tsunami that attacked and devastated Japan. Over 18,500 people were killed, 300,000 people were displaced and there are still 3,000 people unaccounted for. 

Along with the deaths and missing people are the residual impacts this disaster left behind: countless people are still displaced, reconstruction is slow to happen, many small business owners are still left waiting for government assistance, and questions still linger about how this disaster could have been predicted.

The BCI has started its ‘award season’ with great élan and enthusiasm and has added to its growing repertoire of BCI Regional Awards taking the headcount to six this year.

Australasia and Europe have now joined their Asian, Indian, Middle Eastern and North American counterparts in the BCI Global Awards Programme, which puts the international spotlight on BC achievements and talented BC professionals around the world.

Each day on the news, there is a new headline regarding a large corporation that has had its website intruded by anonymous hackers who have released a surprisingly large amount of personal information. The first step to maintaining a large website is to understand the fundamentals of network security.

One of the goals we have set for this year's BCAW is to make Business Continuity a global trending topic through the initiation of a tweet-a-thon. ‘Tweet-off’ will be at 10:30 GMT on Monday, 18th March 2013, marking the beginning of Business Continuity Awareness Week 2013 (BCAW) and will run throughout the whole week, and beyond.

What is a trending topic?