Having decided that a comprehensive disaster recovery plan is a necessity at a time when freakish weather conditions are becoming the norm, many organizations are opting for Cloud-based disaster recovery services. A comprehensive DR “system” is a big task, and many decision-makers are realizing that the manpower and hardware costs associated with creating one in-house are usually much higher than simply contracting out (outsourcing) the job.
For a small to medium sized business, moving DR to the Cloud is not only more cost-efficient, but it also ensures a more resilient DR “system”. By definition, a Cloud service takes your crucial operational data offsite, sometimes a long way offsite, so as not to be impacted by any flooding, fire or long-term power outage that may torment your primary site of operation. In this sense, a Cloud-based DR system is much more resilient than one based in-house.
On the other hand, many organizations worry about the security and safety of their data once they’ve sent it into the Cloud, which is understandable. It is a leap of faith to send your organization’s crucial operational data – its very lifeblood – offsite into some unknown storage servers somewhere “in the ether”. In order to ease fears, organizations need to establish three criteria for their Cloud-based DR providers.
1. Is the Cloud-based DR Provider Stable and Reputable?
The Cloud is very much a recent phenomenon, and there are new entrants this marketplace on a daily basis. You need to ensure that your Cloud-based DR provider is a stable company that has been around for at least a few years, has industry accreditation and affiliations, and that it is not owned or operated by questionable individuals.
You’ve got to do your research. Make sure the company has solid financial backing, a good reputation for delivering a high level of customer service, and that it has not experienced any notable issues or problems in the past.
2. Where Exactly will Your Data Be Stored?
You want to be sure that your Cloud-based DR service is not rooted in locations that are themselves particularly vulnerable to natural disasters such as ice storms, earthquakes, hurricanes, tornadoes, fire or flooding. This means their data centers should not be located near seashores, banks of major rivers, low-lying areas or traditional hurricane / tornado belts.
If your Cloud’s data center is indeed located in some of these vulnerable areas, and many of them are, you want to make sure their network has built-in redundancy, that is, alternate sites in another geographic region to which your data is automatically copied in advance of emergency. Sometimes, the Cloud service will make it known where their data centers are located, but in other cases you will need to ask in order to find out.
3. Security And Support
Once your Cloud provider has your data, you need reassurances that it is kept securely and privately. Do they offer legitimate third-party security certificates? Is your data encrypted when it is stored, and encrypted when it is transmitted? Do they prescribe to prevailing privacy standards and / or EU Safe Harbour provisions?
And what level of service do they offer? Do they provide contract flexibility? What is the nature of their service level agreements, can they respond to support requests off-hours / 7×24 promptly and efficiently? Again, you need to do your due diligence in order to give you peace of mind about your organization’s data.
The whole point of having a DR system in place is to protect your organization’s business continuity in the face of unforeseen crises. You need to ensure that they can do what you may not be able to do.
