Data loss is one of the biggest threats for companies around the world. The results of a global survey show us that 32% of organisations worldwide, have suffered data loss during the previous year! That is one organisation out of three!
Even more scary is that 71% of organizations admit that they don't know if they would be able to recover completely if something unexpected happens in their IT infrastructure!
Don't think it won't happen to you
Unfortunately, the nightmare of a natural disaster sometimes becomes reality. During 2015, lots of disasters happened, everywhere around the globe. If you are still thinking "this won't happen to me", I would suggest you to read this recap of the worst natural disasters of 2015. Add to this the continuous threat of human error, or even malicious attacks (viruses), and you should be aware that the protection of your data is an issue you need to address immediately.
Be prepared, have a plan
One important step to a protected business is to build your corporate data protection plan, in which you include all your infrastructure documentation, procedures, used solutions and partners you work with. Be sure to include a communication scenario in this plan : who needs to be called if anything happens? Create this plan and maintain it, because it's a living document that will change regularly. Don't leave any leaks in this plan, because it will be the core of your data security program.
Test your disaster recovery plan
Once your plan is created, you should test it. At least once a year! A test means that you'd take out one element of your data infrastructure to see what would be the impact on your business, and how fast your plan is working to get everything up and running again. This is really important: a procedure can be very nice on paper, but in reality, things are different!
Choose a strong partner
Lots of companies don't have sufficient internal resources to dedicate to the protection of their data. Also, lots of companies work with a lot of different vendors and solutions: a major IT vendor for the servers, another vendor for the storage, backups on yet another tape system. Next to that, employees are using 'shadow IT solutions' like Dropbox for sharing files with colleagues, etc. And the HR department might be working with a cloud based tool proposed by another partner. Backup up and protecting al your corporate data in all these different systems can become a major hassle.
Choosing a partner for helping you with the protection of your data is an important step to secure your business. It is very important to choose a partner is capable and ready to take on a 100% end-to-end responsibility to avoid discussions between different vendors. In addition to that, you should choose a partner that
- is able to meet you physically
- truly knows your infrastructure
- is easily reachable
- can answer your questions in your own language
- is able to assures a 24/7 service
