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Dispelling the Myths of Backup, Disaster Recovery, and Business Continuity
Mar 27th, 2015 by aperio

Data backup (Backup), disaster recovery (DR), and business continuity (BC) are some of the most misunderstood concepts in Information Technology. There are many misconceptions and myths surrounding Backup, DR, and BC. We are going to define and discuss these important concepts in this series of articles. We will also discuss the importance of having a business disaster recovery plan and a business continuity plan, as well as testing your plans.

Disaster Strikes

What is a disaster for your business? There are many things that can be disastrous to your business. We define a disaster as any event that prevents you from operating your business in a normal manner. Many times we think of fire, tornado, hurricane, earthquake, etc. As disasters. But disasters come in many sizes and levels of severity. We had one client that called about a flooded building that was condemned by the fire marshal. The flood was caused by a faulty sprinkler system on the 3rd floor that caused water to flow through all 3 floors of the building. Another client called about an overflowing toilet that flooded their suite. Yet another client called about a complete power and data failure to their building caused by a backhoe at a neighboring construction site. And then there is the disaster of your system crashing to the point of losing everything on the hard drive and your data is unrecoverable.

All of these are examples of disasters that are localized to a single building, a single suite in a building, or just your business’ I.T. department.

Why do you need Disaster Recovery?

According to many expert sources including Gartner, PricewaterhouseCoopers, and the University of Texas, 70% of businesses that experience a major data loss are out of business within one year and 94% of businesses suffering from a catastrophic data loss do not survive. With those kinds of odds it is like betting your business in Las Vegas if you don’t have some form of disaster recovery in place.

Disaster Recovery

Let’s discuss disaster recovery in general. DR is much more than just copying your data to an external media such as tape, hard drive, or a cloud-based disaster recovery data center. If you truly want disaster recovery then you need to have off-site, duplicate:

  • IT Infrastructure
  • Current copy of ALL your data
  • Remote Access

The duplicate IT infrastructure may vary in quantity and level but at a minimum you should have sufficient resources to run all your business critical application and provide access to all your business critical data for an indefinite period of time. Your data should be replicated daily to the cloud based or private cloud disaster recovery location and you need reliable remote access to these resources.

There are many levels of disaster recovery but we break DR down into the five levels listed below:

  1. Off-Site Data Backup
  2. Cold Disaster Recovery
  3. Warm Disaster Recovery
  4. Hot Disaster Recovery
  5. Fully Redundant Data Centers

We will briefly describe the five DR types in this article but leave the detailed descriptions and discussions for the following articles. In the last article in this series, we will discuss business continuity in more detail.

Data Backup

Data backup is the process of making a copy of your data files on another media. Depending on how much data you have, you can accomplish this process by copying your files to a thumb drive, external hard drive, DVD, tape, another computer, or to an off-site location in the cloud (cloud backup). You could also backup important files to one media set and then all your files to a cloud backup. This would allow rapid, off-line access to important files on say a thumb drive while still having a complete set of files available should catastrophe strike.

There are many pitfalls to backing up your data properly that we will continue to cover in following articles.

Cold Disaster Recovery

Cold DR is when you have your mission critical servers duplicated and your data replicated; all in an off-site data center. Data replication typically occurs on a daily basis but may be more frequent. The servers are not actually turned on so they are not using resources on the data center hardware. Switch over may take a full business day so you can be without access to your applications and data until everything is fully up and running. This is usually the least cost disaster recovery approach.

Warm Disaster Recovery

Warm DR is when you have your mission critical Servers duplicated and your data replicated; all in an off-site data center. Data is typically replicated 4 or more times per day. You may also have some additional non-critical servers duplicated in the data center. The servers are actually running and available so switch over is faster and will usually only take a few hours to complete. This DR approach typically costs more than cold DR.

Hot Disaster Recovery

Hot DR is when you have all your servers duplicated in an off-site data center and your data is replicated in near real-time. The servers are actually running and available. Switch over is an automatic process so down time may be as low as 15 minutes.

Fully Redundant Data Centers

This level is not for most businesses as it is more than just disaster recovery; it is about load balancing and high availability. Only companies with large operations utilize this type of IT infrastructure.

Business Continuity

While your business continuity plan incorporates your IT disaster recovery plan and the other departments’ DR plans, BC is much more. Business continuity speaks to how your business will continue to operate when something happens to stop operations at your main or branch facilities. Even if you have only one location it is important to have a business continuity plan so people know what to do.

Testing and Updating Your Plans

And then there are two of the most overlooked parts of disaster recovery and business continuity; testing and updating. Most companies go through the expense of developing DR and BC Plans then put them in a binder and pat themselves on the back that they have completed the process. The next time the plans are looked at is when a disaster has struck. This is the worst time to get the plan out and review it; people are not familiar with what they should do and many times current configurations are not addressed or holes in the plan are found. Having DR and BC plans is a living process that should be revisited quarterly but at least annually.

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The common sense Guide to Protecting your Computer for viruses
Mar 23rd, 2015 by aperio

There is probably no one who does not browse the internet for various reason. It may be for netbanking, chatting, Facebook, shopping, twitter or just to get some information. Do you know that while internet is a place of fun, it also has dangerous creatures lurking around waiting to find its victim? You would have heard that large organizations have lost critical information like credit card numbers and other information of their customer by hackers. Even home users are not safe. So what do you do? Here are some steps to be performed to be safe and secure on the internet.

 

1. Antivirus – This is the most critical step to be safe. Ensure you have an antivirus software or security software installed on your PC. You can go for paid Antivirus or even installed free antivirus (Microsoft security essentials). Also ensure, the antivirus is updated regularly with the current antivirus definition. Just installing the software will not be enough.

 

2. Emails Safety – Be careful when reading your emails. Now a day we get more spams than genuine emails. Ensure you only open emails from known sources. Do not open emails from unknown sources as they may contain virus. Also do not open attachments received from unknown persons. A simple word attachment may actually be an virus. Do not click on links mentioned in email of unknown persons. Do not believe on emails mentioning that you have received a fortune or an lottery, these are fake.

 

3. Browse authentic sites – Also browse websites you can trust on. Never browse non familiar websites as they may have malware. You will not realise but browsing the website will download Malware on your PC. This malware will collect critical information from you PC and send to hacker without your knowledge.

 

4. Operating system patch update – Ensure you are periodically updating your operating system with the latest patch which is released. For example Windows releases Windows 7 patch once in 15days. The patches contains fixed to new vulnerabilities that are found. Some is true for Mobile apps like IOS or Android. Go to setting and check for ‘Software updates’. If released, install it immediately.

 

The above are the best practices you should follow in order to be safe and secure on the internet. Remember precaution is better than cure and better be safe than be sorry. Kindly let me know if you have more tips by posting your comments, I will modify the same to my post.

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Our Event Was A Huge Hit
Mar 20th, 2015 by aperio

Thank you to everyone who came out and attended our Office 365 Lunch & Learn event.  We would like to give a big shout out to Michael Kopsh From Microsoft for giving us a wonderful presentation on Office 365 and also Mark Bloom & Tommy Phan for letting us know about Unitrends.  The food was delicious everyone learned so much and someone walked away with a brand new Microsoft Surface Pro 3.  Also big thank you to Season’s 52 for helping us cater the event.

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5 Common IT Security Challenges You Might Face in 2015
Mar 16th, 2015 by aperio

Have you ever seen a friend, cousin or a family member bearing financial losses as a result of a poor security policy? Are you afraid of the rising cyber crime rates and wish that you should never experience it? If yes, then read the article to know about the common cybercrime threats that the IT sector faces in 2015.

Many of you might have faced the ill effects of the poor IT security management, but you compromise with the situation by believing it to be in your destiny. Market research firms and IT experts claim that the year 2015 will see the cybercrime associated with the Internet of Things (IoT), social security details, financial information and many others. Experts state that the IOT attacks on businesses and the ever-rising computer hacking cases will shock the virtual users with plenty of new frauds, attacks and malicious software. Websense Security Labs predicts that the malware authors are working stringently to create some smart viruses that can escape from the AV detection tests and give rise to cyber bullying activities. The DDoS Attack Report for Q2 2014 by Prolexic Quarterly Global focuses on improving DDoS protection and enhancing multi-layered web security, meaning that 2015 will experience devastating cyber-attacks. Some major Information Technology companies also ensured that their AV products will carry some advanced features as the cyber crime doesn’t limit to financial losses.

1. Healthcare Sector

Tech experts state that the healthcare sector may experience an increase in data-stealing attacks as hackers are paying attention towards the personally identifiable information to commence major frauds. Physical information, health care details, and medical history will help malware authors to manage a huge web of attacks and give rise to various types of fraud. A hospital computer has a database of millions of patient records in a digital form, so managing and protecting the patient’s personal data will be a major challenge for healthcare IT professionals.

2. Mobile Threats

Since mobile devices are entering into the market at a rapid rate, managing their security and privacy has become a great challenge for security professionals. Malware authors design malicious codes that target credential information rather than collecting the stored data on the device. The auto-login feature of mobile apps makes the portable platforms highly dangerous as mobile devices now give rise to broader credential-stealing or authentication attacks and cyber bullying practices.

3. Attacks Associated to the Internet of Things (IoT)

The Internet of Things (IoT) is the future of computing, and the platform will allow things, humans, appliances, animals and other things communicate with each other over a local network. The connectivity amongst the devices can enhance the speed, efficiency and performance of everything, but the closely connected network can invite some major security flaws, affecting everything connected over a local network. The Internet of things expects to focus on businesses, not on consumer products, and rising cyber crime rates can also impact the new internet-connected device in a business environment. A majority of products and applications can give rise to the business attacks as attackers are likely to attempt establishing a control over all the simple connected devices.

4. Credit Card and Information Deals

Cybercrime and financial information have a strong bond as many malware authors create malicious codes just to fetch your financial information and use them for fraudulent purposes. Some IT experts state that the credit card thieves will soon get morphed into information dealers as financial institutions have already adopted Chip and PIN technology to trim down financial crime rates. They further added that the cybercriminals will now look forward to collecting a broader range of data about victims, consisting of multiple credit cards, geographic location data, personal information, and interests.

5. New Vulnerabilities Will Soon Emerge

Every year comes with new inventions, discoveries and technologies to impact user’s experience and their work environment. Some technologies like fingerprint, UltraHD, wearables and others enhance user’s experience in a positive manner, while some source codes like OpenSSL, Heartbleed and Shellshock make users worried. Software development is growing at a rapid rate and so does the cyber crime. Malware authors, software developers, and hackers may come up with new features and integrations to impact the base code and exploit the vulnerabilities to steal away your private information.

Conclusion

Undoubtedly, cybercriminals will continue to adopt evasive techniques and methods to break through the security systems and enter into your devices to steal the valuable information. But, it becomes highly important to stop them right now as the future will experience interlinked things and impacting any one of them may lead to the violation of the whole environment. Some tech experts claim that the malware authors will continue innovating malicious codes that can effectively escape from AV tests, after analyzing recent cyber crime trends and tactics. According to the results derived from the common AV tests, experts predict that the year 2015 will see a tremendous increase in the Internet crime rates, but with greater frequency and sophistication. If you think that your devices don’t feature optimal AV protections, then simply research the web and find efficient online computer support companies to handle your PC security issues.

 

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/8886902
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How to properly dispose of sensitive computer information
Mar 13th, 2015 by aperio

Storage devices like the hard drives are mainly used to store sensitive information in digital format. They are being used almost in every sector nowadays. When these drives are no longer needed, you may throw it at any dumpsite, enabling intruders to access all your confidential data.

With the advancement in the IT sector, data security, even while you are getting grid of it, is not a big issue anymore, unless you are not aware of how to go about it. It is important to hire a reputed and trustworthy data destruction service provider that protects all your sensitive data at any cost. Depending on the needs of the client, these companies offer the off-site and on-site destruction services.

If you want to keep top-level security for your data, you need to hire the services of a certified company, which can efficiently destroy the confidential data whenever necessary. There are a number of benefits of appointing a data destruction company. Read on to know more about how such companies can benefit you.

Ongoing Quality Control Checking

Data destruction companies set required standards and employ quality control checks, in order to destroy all your digital data safely. Some companies that destroy their own data do not set any standards and employ quality control checks. Due to this reason, there is no guarantee that all their data is destroyed safely.

Offers many more services

There are a lot of data destruction techniques that are used by professional companies. Crushing is one of the effective and widely used techniques to make your data unrecoverable. Because crushing guarantees that sensitive information does not leave the business premises, many companies prefer this approach. Degaussing is another technique that removes the magnetic properties of the HDD (hard disk drive).

Boost your company reputation

Some security violating techniques such as data breaching can lead to very serious problems, and greatly affect your company’s reputation. Data destruction companies employ personnel who are good at handling procedures related to destruction of personal consumer data. Proper demolition of sensitive information helps to achieve utmost security, which in turn boosts your company’s reputation.

Responsible disposal

It is very important to collect the stuff and dispose it in a responsible way. A professional destruction company will help a lot to dispose it off in a more responsible way. In addition to this, they also ensure a safer and cleaner environment.

Cost Effectiveness

By hiring experienced and well-known data destruction firm, you can save a lot of your time and money. However, it is important that you research well about the company, before hiring them.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/8955110
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