Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity, 3rd Edition

Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity, 3rd Edition

by Thejandra BS
Released January 2014
Publisher(s): IT Governance Publishing
ISBN: 9781849285384

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Book description

What would you do if your systems were hacked or compromised by a virus? How would your IT systems cope in the event of flooding or an explosion?

What if your IT systems simply stopped working?

IT has brought many benefits to business. However, IT failures can seriously damage your ability to deliver products and services, harm your company’s reputation, and jeopardise your relationship with your customers. In short, poorly managed IT problems could threaten the survival of your business.

Create a Survival Plan

If you want to protect your business, you need to put in place a business continuity (BC) and disaster recovery (DR) plan to help your business survive. Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity, a quick guide for organisations and business managers shows you how to develop a plan that will:

  • keep your information safe
  • safeguard your company from viruses and phishing scams.
  • store data safely, and prevent years of work from being lost by accident.
  • ensure your communication links are secure, and keep you connected when disaster strikes
  • bomb-proof your data
  • protect your data in the event of fire or flood.

    • Read this practical guide and start building a business survival plan today

    About the author

    Thejendra B.S is the IT manager for a software development firm in Bangalore, and has over 20 years of experience in IT. Besides working in India, his career has also taken him to Saudi Arabia, Dubai, Bahrain and Australia. He has dealt with customers in many different areas of business, and has written many articles for websites such as techrepublic.com and drj.com. Visit www.thejendra.com for details of his other books and articles.

    Table of contents

    1. Cover
    2. Title
    3. Copyright
    4. About the Author
    5. Foreword
    6. Preface
    7. Contents
    8. Chapter 1: Introduction to Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity
      1. Who should read this book?
      2. What is a disaster?
      3. What is disaster recovery (DR)?
      4. What is business continuity (BC)?
      5. What is Crisis Management?
      6. Why are DR and BC important?
      7. Who are the real owners of DR, BC, and CM?
      8. What is the cost of a disaster?
      9. Who are the right persons to manage DR and BC?
      10. What is a DR or BC site?
      11. What is a command centre?
      12. Where should a DR or BC site be located?
      13. Can an organisation manage DR and BC alone?
      14. What about DR and BC assistance from external consultants?
      15. What kinds of disaster should an organisation be aware of?
      16. What is a technical risk?
      17. What are some of the most common technical risks?
      18. What are some of the most common non-technical disasters?
      19. What is a business impact analysis (BIA)?
      20. Who can invoke BC?
      21. What are the options available for BC?
      22. What is a DR or BC exercise?
      23. What are the biggest roadblocks for DR or BC?
      24. What are the costs of establishing a proper DR facility?
      25. Are there any international qualifications or training for DR and BC?
      26. Are there any international standards for BC planning?
    9. Chapter 2: Data Disasters
      1. What is data?
      2. What is meant by risk to data?
      3. Why and how do companies lose data?
      4. How should organisations store data safely?
      5. What are some of the most common storage and back-up options?
      6. What is meant by Recovery Time Objective (RTO) and Recovery Point Objective (RPO)?
      7. What is Internet back-up?
      8. What is a ‘geocluster’?
      9. How often should back-ups be taken, and what should be backed up?
      10. How can one decide what data needs to be backed-up?
      11. How and where should back-up tapes be stored?
      12. How often should back-ups be tested?
      13. Will taking proper data back-ups daily ensure DR?
      14. What is ‘disk mirroring’?
      15. What is a ‘database replication’?
      16. What does ‘server load balancing’ mean?
      17. How can one prevent loss of IT equipment?
      18. On-site disaster prevention methods:
    10. Chapter 3: Virus Disasters
      1. What is a computer virus?
      2. How can an organisation protect itself from viruses?
      3. What is a worm?
      4. What is a Trojan?
      5. How can an organisation recover after a virus attack?
      6. How does one update anti-virus software on all machines?
      7. Dos and don’ts regarding viruses
      8. What is ‘phishing’?
      9. What about safety on mobile devices?
    11. Chapter 4: Communication System Disasters
      1. What are some of the common methods of communication in organisations?
      2. What is a communication failure?
      3. What are some of the methods for preventing Local Area Network failures?
      4. What are some methods for preventing WAN disasters?
      5. Dos and don’ts regarding communication systems
    12. Chapter 5: Software Disasters
      1. What is a software disaster?
      2. What is a mission critical application?
      3. What are some of the software disasters that can strike an organisation?
      4. What are some of the best practices for software disaster prevention?
    13. Chapter 6: Data Centre Disasters
      1. What is a data centre?
      2. How should a data centre be built?
      3. What are some of the best practices to prevent disasters inside data centres?
      4. Other precautions to prevent IT disasters
    14. Chapter 7: IT Staff Member Disasters
      1. Who is meant by members of IT staff?
      2. What are the general precautions to prevent disasters relating to members of IT staff?
      3. What is an appropriate IT member of staff ratio?
      4. What are the usual reasons for members of IT staff disasters?
      5. What are some of the best practices to be followed by members of IT staff?
      6. What are the main benefits of using ITIL?
      7. How can change management prevent disasters?
      8. What are the other risks relating to members of IT staff?
    15. Chapter 8: IT Contractor Disasters
      1. What is an IT contractor-related disaster?
      2. How can organisations protect themselves against IT vendor-related disasters?
      3. How does one prevent IT-contractor support disasters?
      4. Should IT staff be outsourced?
      5. What can be outsourced?
      6. Questions to ask vendors
      7. Is it necessary to have contracts with vendors?
      8. What are the key elements of a maintenance contract or an SLA?
    16. Chapter 9: IT Project Failures
      1. Why do IT projects fail?
      2. How can organisations avoid IT project failures?
    17. Chapter 10: Information Security
      1. What is information security?
      2. What are the various ways in which information security can be compromised?
      3. What safeguards are available to protect information?
    18. Chapter 11: Cyber Security Issues
      1. What is Cyber Security?
      2. What is hacking?
      3. How can an organisation prevent hacking?
      4. Exploring Cloud services
    19. Chapter 12: Introduction to Non-IT Disasters
      1. What are some of the non-IT disasters that could affect an organisation?
      2. What is a human error?
      3. What are marketing and sales errors?
      4. What are financial disasters?
      5. What are some of the common recruitment risks?
      6. How do you handle fire related disasters?
      7. What about health and biological threats to an organisation’s members of staff?
      8. What about electrical failures and blackouts?
      9. What precautions can an organisation take to handle civil disturbances?
      10. How can an organisation take precaution against terrorism?
      11. What is a travel-related risk?
      12. What are the usual trade or labour union problems?
      13. What about the psychological effects of a disaster on members of staff?
      14. What is a reputational risk?
      15. What about industrial espionage?
      16. How can an organisation prevent a disaster relating to paper documents?
      17. What other precautions can an organisation take?
    20. Chapter 13: Disaster Recovery at Home
      1. What are the main risks associated with home working?
      2. What are some of the ways to prevent disasters occurring in homes?
      3. Document and data management
      4. Data back-up for standalone systems
      5. Sample recommended solution
    21. Chapter 14: Plenty of Questions
      1. Questions on planning and security
      2. Questions on technology
      3. Questions on health and safety
      4. Questions on financial and legal issues
      5. Questions on people
    22. Chapter 15: How do I get Started?
      1. How does one start a DR or BC programme?
      2. How do I create an actual BCP?
      3. Common types of plans
      4. How is an IT contingency plan prepared?
      5. Sample IT contingency plan for a mission critical server
      6. What is a mock run and how is it conducted?
      7. How often should the DR or BC plan be updated?
      8. What should a BC/DR checklist consist of?
      9. Sample useful checklists
    23. Appendix 1: Disaster Recovery Training and Certification
    24. Appendix 2: Business Continuity Standards
      1. ISO22301
    25. Apendix 3: Making DR and BC Exciting
    26. Appendix 4: Disaster Recovery Glossary
    27. ITG Resources

    Product information

    • Title: Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity, 3rd Edition
    • Author(s): Thejandra BS
    • Release date: January 2014
    • Publisher(s): IT Governance Publishing
    • ISBN: 9781849285384