IT Disaster Recovery
Additionally, many businesses are required to create and follow plans for disaster recovery and data protection in order to meet compliance regulations. This is particularly important for organizations operating in financial, healthcare, manufacturing and government sectors. Failure to have DR procedures in place can result in legal or regulatory penalties, so understanding how to comply with resiliency standards is important.
While performing the Merysol Security IT Disaster Recovery plan, we take a look whether the Customer has in place a Business Continuity plan. We will note in the report the actual existence or absence of the plan. And, if it doesn’t exist, will recommend to be created at the earliest convenience.
IT Disaster Recovery Service Performance.
Merysol Security can be engaged to either create a new IT Disaster Recovery Plan or to test an existing one. The purpose of testing an existing plan is to discover possible flaws in it so the Customer can resolve them before they impact the ability to restore operations.
If a new Plan is to be developed, Merysol Security will work closely with the business owner and the IT specialist ( if different from the business owner), to create a practical, cost effective plan. The proposed new plan will be tested to ensure it actually works.
The IT Disaster Recovery Plan engagement consists of the following steps:
> It begins with a meeting, typically one-hour long, between the business owner and his/her IT representative (if available); and a Merysol Security Expert. In this meeting the IT Disaster Recovery Plan process is presented, anticipated cooperation from the business is discussed, and the deliverable Plan is explained along with the expected duration of the engagement.
> Merysol Security proceeds to deliver a questionnaire. This tailored questionnaire is intended to define the IT in operation to implement a data backup plan. It also covers the business activities and personnel involved in emergency operations to restore business as usual.
> The Customer’s person in charge of IT ( 80% of the time is the business owner), fills out the questionnaire either by himself/herself, or with help from Merysol Security. When completed, it submits it to Merysol Security
>Merysol Security analyses the questionnaire and prepares the deliverable Disaster Recovery Plan. The Plan is delivered to the Customer in electronic form.
> A meeting is scheduled to discuss the Plan findings and recommendations. Next steps, if any, are discussed
The duration of this engagement is highly dependent on the complexity of the operation and the time it takes the Customer to fill the questionnaire. It usually takes to to four (2-4) weeks.
Nowadays it is common for small businesses to engage a Managed Service Provider (MSP) to be their IT expert rather than hire the IT expert in-house. The MSP should be very familiar with the Customer’s DR Plan so they can be effective during an attack requiring to exercise it.
