Too many companies think they have disaster recovery measures in place, when in reality no one really knows whether they will work or how to implement them. The problem is that no one person is given the responsibility for disaster recovery, and therefore there is often no follow through.. . .
Too many companies think they have disaster recovery measures in place, when in reality no one really knows whether they will work or how to implement them. The problem is that no one person is given the responsibility for disaster recovery, and therefore there is often no follow through.

Testing policies requires simulating a complete system failure, something that most people balk at in case they cannot actually recover.

It is a sad fact of business life that disaster recovery is something that is only thought about after some catastrophic event, such as terrorist attacks or the floods that blight parts of the UK on a yearly basis.

How to build a disaster recovery process
The starting point for any disaster recovery strategy is a corporate policy, which needs to specify what constitutes a 'critical system'.

It might be something as mundane as an active directory server, or as complex as a distributed database. It could be outside the building, such as the power supply or leased lines, or inside, such as an ageing tape drive used for the daily backup of the accounts system.

Whatever it is, you need to identify it and decide what action to take to prevent it causing a catastrophic failure. In essence, this is simply a case of risk management.

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