Businesses today rely heavily on the cloud infrastructure provided by Amazon Web Services (AWS) to drive innovation, enhance scalability, and streamline operations. However, with this reliance comes the imperative need to safeguard against potential disruptions that compromise business continuity and an organization’s reputation. This is where Disaster Recovery (DR) steps in as a critical component of any organization’s AWS strategy.

The cloud provides multiple benefits for running services and storing data. Just like with data stored on-premises, data stored offsite and in the cloud should be backed up. Data stored in the cloud is not invulnerable by default, as the risk of data loss is still present due to accidental deletions and cloud-specific threats. At the same time, the cloud can be useful for disaster recovery.

The founder of the Boy Scouts, Robert Baden-Powell, once said “Be Prepared… the meaning of the motto is that a scout must prepare himself by previous thinking out and practicing how to act on any accident or emergency so that he is never taken by surprise.” Much like the Boy Scouts, IT departments must also embrace the “Be Prepared” motto. Emergencies and accidents are no longer a matter of “if” but “when”.

In a world driven by data, the importance of disaster recovery solutions cannot be overstated. From natural disasters to cyberattacks and human errors, the risks of data loss continues to grow alongside businesses. Today, we will cover the 3 common mistakes companies make when creating a DR strategy, key steps for building an effective DR strategy for your business, and the ways Opti9 can protect your data in AWS.

February 21, 2024 | By Ryan Felkel Amidst the growing shift towards cloud adoption and reliance, ensuring the resilience of your cloud infrastructure is paramount. With Amazon Web Services (AWS) serving as a cornerstone of many organizations’ cloud strategies, mastering disaster recovery within the AWS ecosystem is essential.

Businesses around the world face unexpected disruptions ranging from cyberattacks to natural disasters. Data breaches have also become a pressing concern for companies worldwide, with the average cost of a breach reaching an all-time high of USD 4.45 million in 2023. Such events can cause catastrophic data loss and operational downtime. This is where a robust disaster recovery plan becomes more than a safety net, it’s a crucial element of business resilience.

In the IT industry, downtime is typically estimated at approximately $5,600 per minute, posing a significant threat to revenue, customer trust, and compliance. For SMBs, safeguarding data and ensuring business continuity are paramount for survival and competitiveness. A robust disaster recovery (DR) solution not only protects against threats like cyberattacks and hardware failures but also minimizes downtime, demonstrating reliability to customers and partners.

However safe and resilient your company’s operations might be, there’s always the chance that something will occur to interrupt business operations. Hence every company should have a disaster recovery plan that maps out how to respond to a disaster, so that the company can return to normal operations as soon as possible. That said, companies need to do more than write a plan.

True cyber resilience involves much more than having a disaster recovery (DR) solution. That’s because recovery from a typical DR scenario is different than recovery from a cyber event. Why? For starters, disaster recovery scenarios usually involve human nature, mother nature, or technical failure: These are just a few examples.