Disaster Recovery Journal

Sponsored by COOP

As BCM practices mature, accentuated by the new ISO standard due in 2011i, many professionals are looking to organize their programs into a Business Continuity Management System (BCMS). Related structural needs require adjustment and realignment from typical BC program management. The best source of leadership to enable this change is to look at best practice in the implementation and design of other ISO and BS Management Systems and to adopt these for the structures of a BCMS..

Sponsored by COOP

COOP Systems has learned that the implementation of large scale Business Continuity (BC) software projects is fundamentally different. This paper explores why these programs often fall short of their objectives. We start by making observations about actual project problems the authors have witnessed. After reviewing senior management needs, three basic principles are defined to ensure effective deployment and project success.

Sponsored by Riverbed

To remain competitive in a global marketplace, businesses need to adapt quickly to ever‐changing requirements. These days consumers and businesses expect to get the products and data where and when they want it. With data continuing to grow at a dizzying pace and new technologies like server and storage virtualization, orchestration, automation, and even cloud services more readily available and adopted, organizations can easily become overwhelmed when it comes to architecting an effective business continuity/disaster recovery (BC/DR) environment. This paper provides practical advice for maintaining a functional DR strategy, and for streamlining business continuity solutions.

Sponsored by Send Word Now

At Send Word Now, we take security very seriously, and we approach all aspects of our infrastructure and services with this in mind. Whether it concerns the location of our equipment, the method of firewall changes, or our process management, we manage every detail in order to properly safeguard our customers' data on a platform that is secure, reliable, and resilient. Our goal is to provide the most secure notification platform in the industry and offer our customers a system that they can trust.

Sponsored by Riverbed

Business continuity and disaster recovery can mean either life or death for a company. In the event of a disaster, inadequate planning and/or technology deployment can compromise a return to operations and bring financial downfall. With this in mind, we note that operational continuity and recovery objectives continue to increase in priority for commercial and government entities alike. Recovery objectives once measured in days or hours are now measured in seconds or minutes. This IDC white paper highlights the challenges and best practices for implementing continuity and recovery solutions, and details how Riverbed WAN optimization solutions enable firms to meet their recovery requirements.

Sponsored by MissionMode

Many organizations treat a crisis as a series of tactical issues affecting operational silos, rather than reviewing the needs of the crisis response at the organizational and strategic level. Organizations need a strategic view of crisis management that encompasses the whole enterprise. This white paper examines how to create that strategic view while reducing threats and deriving value from the distributed nature of the organization.

Sponsored by MissionMode

Large, complex plans often prove ineffective during a crisis. In this free white paper, a prominent crisis management expert describes a new way to streamline crisis management and focus on the key aspects of the response. By using operational and communication plans, coupled with a crisis support system, an organization can react and recover more quickly.

Sponsored by Riverbed

The explosion of 24x7 connectivity, combined with the growing demand for wherever-whenever data availability, has exposed serious shortcomings in how data is protected and managed. This paper examines various disaster recovery (DR) planning strategies, and details different approaches as well as the benefits of deploying Riverbed® Whitewater® cloud storage gateways to provide fast recovery should the unexpected occur. Download the white paper to learn more.

Sponsored by i365

This eBook addresses business drivers for storage, data protection and disaster recovery—how to plan for cloud storage—with special considerations for defining the right cloud-based backup and recovery plan.

Sponsored by i365

Disasters happen in many ways and can disrupt or even destroy your business. Location determines the amount of risk you want to accept or mitigate. This whitepaper will share key insights on disaster recovery planning including what data you need to protect, how current your data should be, how quickly you need to recover lost or damaged files, and how to determine what level of risk is right for your company.

Sponsored by i365

The increasing adoption of virtualization is due to significant cost savings. However, when it comes to data protection, virtualization can be complex without the right virtualization strategy. Read this whitepaper to learn:

·Why virtualization simplifies and streamlines data protection over conventional approaches
·Six key benefits when designing your virtual environment
·Why EVault cloud-connected data protection services are ideal for your heterogeneous environment – from endpoints and servers to the cloud

Sponsored by i365

The increasing adoption of virtualization is due to significant cost savings. However, when it comes to data protection, virtualization can be complex without the right virtualization strategy. Read this whitepaper to learn:

·Why virtualization simplifies and streamlines data protection over conventional approaches
·Six key benefits when designing your virtual environment
·Why EVault cloud-connected data protection services are ideal for your heterogeneous environment – from endpoints and servers to the cloud

Sponsored by i365

Want data protection that's state of the art? Get true disk-to-disk. Looking for unbeatable scalability and flexibility? Head for the clouds. Is company data subject to super-aggressive RTOs or a policy mandating onsite storage? On-premise is the answer.

Read this whitepaper to learn:

·How pairing on-premise disk-based technology with the cloud brings your organization the best of both world.

· How a cloud-connected solution meets your (onsite) rapid recovery and (offsite) disaster recovery needs
·What differentiates EVault from other backup and recovery solutions
·What scenarios work best with a cloud-connected environment

Sponsored by Sungard

Most organizations lack three fundamental components essential to managing recovery from a disaster: continually updated recovery processes, staff availability for test and recovery, and on-staff recovery expertise. Finding the right service provider with the experience necessary to deliver effective recovery management cover that gap effectively and efficiently.

Sponsored by Sungard

Managing recovery effectively is complex. A fully managed recovery solution removes the burden of that complexity from an IT organization. And when the recovery solution leverages modernized data movement technologies and a range of secure cloud and virtual infrastructures, the advantages are significant: higher availability, better performance, and lower cost.

Sponsored by Novell

As a busy data center manager, you might be struggling to keep up with the challenge of continually doing more with fewer resources. IT has become an integral part of business operation; in fact, most, if not all of the infrastructure you support is critical for keeping your company up and running. However, despite being asked to do more with less, you probably haven't gotten any more budget or team members, so you may have been forced to put some projects on the back burner. Chances are disaster recovery is one of those projects you'd like to bring to the front of the priority queue, and for good reason. It's nearly impossible to turn on the news without being bombarded by all the potential risk out in the world. Whether it is turbulent weather, natural disasters or man-made accidents, something bad seems to always be happening. When is the last time you took a look at your disaster recovery planning? What do you expect would happen if the ceiling collapsed in your data center?

Sponsored by Avalution

This updated white paper analyzes the business case for pursuing organizational business continuity certification, including what it takes to complete the certification process and how best to begin preparing.

Sponsored by Recovery Point

"Cloud computing" is today's hottest topic in IT. Cloud backup has already become a thriving category; now larger-scale cloud recovery is emerging as the next logical extension of that service. But what do these terms mean? Do customers' assumptions about the cloud in general, and backup and recovery in particular, match the services that providers are actually offering? More importantly, can cloud backup and recovery improve the effectiveness and efficiency of disaster recovery efforts, simplify processes and reduce cost ?

Sponsored by Everbridge

Disaster Planning and Business Continuity are two of the fastest growing fields in both the commercial and government sectors. Analysis of past disasters has shown that communications are a major limiting factor in disaster response. This paper examines the many historical reasons communications might fail during emergencies, and then directly applies the dynamic technology of mass notification as a remedy to many of those failures.

Sponsored by Riverbed

Data protection is simple: take everything and copy it somewhere far enough away so that you'll have it when you need it — in an emergency. The challenge is how to do this in the most efficient and reliable way. Deploying WAN optimization solutions from Riverbed can help you protect more, recover faster, reduce risk and save money. Get the facts about how Riverbed optimizes disaster recovery across the widest range of backup mechanisms, with no changes to your software or storage now.

Sponsored by SIOS

Protecting critical applications within any organization is the most important mission of your IT department. System failures, human error, power outages and natural disasters put business critical information at risk of being inaccessible for extended periods of time or worse, permanently lost.You need solid protection against crippling data loss and application unavailability.

Continuous availability is no longer an ideal it is a necessity. Longer work days, expansion into new markets and customer demand for more efficient services create an expanded requirement for increased system availability. Users are demanding a means of ensuring very high availability of their applications and of access to data that permits them to accomplish their tasks and provide the highest levels of customer service. Interruption of workflow due to system failure is expensive and it can cause the loss of business. The need to increase computer system availability is becoming a key businesses concern.

Sponsored by SIOS

Business data is the lifeblood of your company and assuring it is always available is the most important mission of your IT organization. System failures, human error, power outages and natural disasters put business critical information at risk of being inaccessible for extended periods of time or worse, permanently lost. You need solid protection against crippling data loss and application unavailability. Continuous availability is no longer an ideal it is a necessity. Longer work days, expansion into new markets and customer demand for more efficient services create an expanded requirement for increased system availability. Users are demanding a means of ensuring very high availability of their applications and of access to data that permits them to accomplish their tasks and provide the highest levels of customer service. Interruption of workflow due to system failure is expensive and it can cause the loss of business. The need to increase computer system availability is becoming a key businesses concern.

Sponsored by Novell

The global recession, increased competition requiring just-in-time processes, squeezed information technology (IT) budgets, explosive data growth, and new regulatory requirements have all increased the importance of disaster recovery (DR). As a result, organizations are now under pressure to create, re-evaluate and update their disaster recovery plans. Looking across the DR industry today, there are hundreds of solutions whose value should be measured in three ways: cost, performance and risk.

Sponsored by Everbridge

This white paper outlines ten major questions to ask every vendor you evaluate to help cut through sales pitches and marketing noise so you can get to the fundamentals of each system and its fit within your organization.

Sponsored by Everbridge

A mass notification system is an integral component of an organization's emergency and routine communications capabilities. While these systems are most often associated with emergency notification for contacting employees during and after a disaster, mass notification dramatically improves an organization's operational efficiency and bottom line when implemented for day-to-day operations. Just a few common examples include alerting supply chain members about a needed change in delivery schedules; reminding employees about policy changes, deadlines, and other time-sensitive information; and mobilizing IT staff more quickly after a server goes down all make an organization and its employees more efficient and competitive.

Sponsored by Everbridge

Do you know what you will say in the critical first minutes after receiving reports of an active shooter on campus? How about six hours into the incident? What will you tell people when your county issues a flood watch or the power in your building goes out at 10:00 a.m. on a Monday?

Sponsored by Avalution

What's the "typical" background of someone responsible for a business continuity (BC) program? What's a "typical" BC program structure? What deliverables should I expect after a business continuity planning project? The answer to all three questions is simple – "it depends." Business continuity programs are unique to each organization, and the background of the business continuity professional is diverse. Due to the unique nature of business continuity programs and their assigned professionals, getting a business continuity program off the ground can be challenging. This "side" of the brochure will assist you, the newly named business continuity owner, in determining your future business continuity program's key characteristics, with the objective of designing and implementing an efficient and effective risk management strategy.

Sponsored by eBRP

Every organization must choose its own objectives, but if the goal of your organization's BCM program is assuring the ability to survive any disruption.

Sponsored by eBRP

If a BIA is a fundamental part of BCM, the underlying cost may simply be a necessary evil. But, when a BIA is a one-time 'project' – as in many organizations – is the cost realistically proportional to its value?

Sponsored by Riverbed

Wide area network (WAN)-based approaches to data backup are dramatically influenced by WAN bandwidth limitations and network latency. Without significant, costly WAN bandwidth upgrades this can make WAN-based backup impossible for large remote offices with significant data stores. Riverbed makes network-based backup feasible, in many cases through use of existing WAN links, without the need for bandwidth upgrades. Our intelligent, storage-specific optimizations yield higher data reduction ratios for the common enterprise workloads seen in SRDF/A environments at both the network and application level, enabling enterprises to realize up to a 30:1 compression while maintaining a high throughput. Download this paper and learn more about this strategy today.

Sponsored by Riverbed

Storing data in the cloud using a Whitewater™ cloud storage gateway from Riverbed Technology overcomes what is becoming a serious challenge for IT departments: how to manage the vast, and ever-growing, amount of data that must be protected. Whitewater eliminates concerns about data security, data transmission speeds over the Internet, and data availability, while providing great flexibility and a favorable return on investment. Moving data to the cloud replaces the high costs of tape and disk storage systems with a pay-as-you-go cloud storage tier. This paper makes the business case for cloud storage, outlining where capital and operational costs can be eliminated or avoided by using the cloud for backup and archive storage.

Sponsored by Send Word Now

MIDTOWN, New York City - When a steam pipe burst at East 41st and Lexington during the afternoon rush hour on July 18, 2007, a rust-colored geyser of near-boiling water erupted nearly 100 feet into the air, causing cars to flip and commuters to flee for their lives. The blast of steam and the resulting shower of debris continued for two hours, raising fears of asbestos contamination in the neighborhood, and forcing authorities to cut off access to the affected streets. One death and over 30 injuries were reported on the day of the accident, but the effects of the crisis continued even after the streets were cleared. It was estimated that the financial losses in the frozen zone surrounding Grand Central Station reached upwards of $30MM, and impacted over 100 businesses in the area. In the aftermath of unexpected incidents such as this one, a business can suffer tremendous losses very quickly, especially if it's not prepared. And, as we will see in this paper, even proper planning is not sufficient without the ability to implement and carry out a business continuity plan both quickly and easily.

Sponsored by Send Word Now

When you're choosing an emergency notification provider, it's important to select a platform that's easily accessible, no matter where you are or when a crisis occurs. In today's world, that means having mobile access at all times.