Lack of disaster planning led to present crisis
Everyone came to the same conclusion: A lack of disaster planning was a key component to the extent of the damage and loss of life. Seventeen charity and civil society organizations met at the Jeddah Chamber of Commerce and Industry (JCCI) to organize their efforts after a few days of spontaneous but much appreciated mobilized work to collect and distribute donations in the affected areas. This followed a warning issued by the Governorate cautioning individuals and groups against donating haphazardly and instead directed them to give their donations through registered charity organizations, which are supposed to coordinate their distribution work with the Jeddah Governorate to ensure that the donations reach those who need them. Discussions quickly revealed a lack of coordination among the charities and with the relevant government offices, namely the Civil Defense and the governorate. While several charities focused on the hardest hit areas, which needed every parcel of assistance it could get, other areas that were also hit hard were almost neglected. It turns out that Al-Sawaed, which has become a ghost town with only ruins, and all the Kilo areas and Mahameed were in bad shape. Poor neighborhoods in downtown Jeddah such as Ghulail and Karantina were also stricken with residents living in knee-high stinking sewage with barely the essentials to live by. Other areas hit hard include Um Alsalam, Bahra, Jamaa, Al-Musaid.
Many Businesses Fail After a Disaster
Businesses’ reliance on IT systems and digital data has never been greater. The 2007 Best’s Underwriting Guide found that only 6% of companies that suffer catastrophic data loss survive while 43% never reopen and 51% close within 2 years of the disaster. Best’s Underwriting Guide 2007 also found that 93% of the companies that did not have their data backed up in the event of a disaster went out of business. An analysis of SMBs’ prioritization of disaster recovery, backup and high availability for 2008 shows that businesses understand the risks to their business and the value of protection. However, many organizations still think that backup is a sufficient disaster recovery plan. However, mid-sized enterprises are at the most risk to disaster and are more likely to rely strictly on backup as a disaster recovery plan. The needs and resources of mid-market firms are unique. Midsized companies must work with limited finances infrastructure and human resources. Robust disaster recovery used to be affordable and manageable only by large enterprises. Mid-sized enterprises relied more on backup than on a formal disaster recovery plan. As businesses’ reliance on IT has grown, backup has increasingly shown its weaknesses. However, the introduction and maturation of several key technologies, such as virtualization, have brought affordable and easily implementable Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity to small and mid-sized companies. SMBs do not always equate virtualization with Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity because awareness of the many virtualization applications is just starting to grow.
US Smart Grid Could Cause Business Interruptions - Disaster Planning Consideration
A cybersecurity coordination task force released a report that assesses various security and privacy requirements for the U.S. Smart Grid, as well as strategies needed to address them. It looks at security and disaster planning issues. The 256-page document was compiled by the task force, composed of individuals from the government, industry, academia, and regulatory bodies, and led by the National Institutes of Standards and Technology (NIST). Now open for comment, NIST will release a final version of the document in March 2010 describing a overall Smart Grid security architecture and security requirements. The draft report highlights the need for planners to address threats that could potentially allow attackers to penetrate the smart grid, gain access to control software, and alter load conditions to cause widespread disruptions. Cybersecurity strategies for protecting the smart grid need to address not only deliberate attacks but also inadvertent compromises resulting from user errors, equipment failures and buggy software, the report said. Released as part of the report was a Privacy Impact Analysis that examines some of the privacy implications of establishing a smart grid for power distribution. A smart grid uses digital technology to transmit, distribute, and deliver power to consumer in a more reliable and efficient manner than traditional electricity systems. A key component of the smart grid is the real-time, two-way communication it establishes between consumers and power distributors for tracking energy use and enabling smarter consumption and pricing. Current plans call for nearly 17 million two-way connected smart meters to be installed in U.S. homes over the next few years.
How do i test HA and DRS in vmware ESXi 4.0 evaluation ?
i wanted to test HA and DRS using Evaluation license .. but it gives an error while i tried to enable HA under a cluster configuration. Vmotion is asking for a license … can anybody help me out that is it posible to test the HA and DRS under evaluation license ? if yes pls let me know the steps and releated links for downloading that software . waiting for a quick response pelaseregards…apu
Disaster Plan & Business Continuity Infrastructure
The key technology elements of a Disaster Recovery Plan and Business Continuity Plan (DRP/BCP) infrastructure are the primary data center, a remote site that duplicates the resources in that primary location and the method used to get files (master and transaction) between the two sites - such as high-bandwidth network connections. The best DRP/BCP strategies follow a “redundant every-thing” philosophy throughout the data center. Multiple mainframes and servers should run in the production and backup data facilities. Then, if a component in the production system encounters problems, it immediately fails over to the local backup as a first line of defense. Power supplies and communication links are one of the most critical components in a DRP/BCP strategy.
Roles in Developing a Disaster Recovery Plan
The disaster recovery policy must be reviewed at least annually to assure its relevance. Just as in the development of such a policy, a planning team that consists of upper management, and personnel from information security, information technology, human resources, or other operations should be assembled to review the disaster policy. Roles and responsibilities of the planning team should be as follows: Perform an initial risk assessment to determine current information systems vulnerabilities. Perform an initial business impact analysis to document and understand the interdependencies among business processes and determine how the business would be affected by an information systems outage. Take an inventory of information systems assets such as computer hardware, software, applications, and data. Identify single points of failure within the information systems infrastructure. Identify critical applications, systems, and data. Prioritize key business functions. The Disaster Recovery Plan Template has tools that can be used immediately and defined in detail all of these responsiblities and provides a work plan that can be use as is.
