Information technology blog, cybersecurity blog

Editor's note: This article was originally published in 2019, but has been updated to reflect the latest information. 

Editor’s note: This article was originally posted in 2017 with the title How to Make Sure You Have Disaster-Ready Data Backups, but has been updated to reflect more comprehensive and current information. 

If you are like many business leaders, you may assume that as long as your data is backed up you can weather any “storm” that life throws your way. 

Editor's note: This article was originally published in 2019, but has been updated to include the latest, most comprehensive information. Most business leaders don’t relish the idea of the possibility that disaster will strike their organization. Whether it’s a natural or man-made disaster, the ramifications can be equally damaging. At a minimum, disasters of either kind can cause downtime, damage to your reputation, and financial loss. 

As a business leader, you have a lot on your mind. Finances, staffing, deliverables, sales, and more. At least your IT infrastructure is working. One less thing to think about, right? Well…maybe, but maybe not. 

Thrive Global recently conducted a Q&A with Kelser President Jim Parise as part of the outlet's series on “5 Things You Need to Know to Optimize Your Company’s Approach to Data Privacy and Cybersecurity.” The article also ran in Authority Magazine.

Senior consulting engineer Andrew Tyler was a panelist for a recent cybersecurity virtual forum presented by the Hartford Business Journal. The theme of the forum was how the pandemic has forced a change in the way many businesses approach cybersecurity in this new work-from-home world.

The novel coronavirus pandemic has taught us several lessons already and there’s likely more to learn. We’ve learned the definition of essential businesses and personnel during a time of crisis, the term “social distancing”, which employees are able to perform their duties remotely, and more. We’ve also learned that pandemics need to be included in every organization’s business continuity/disaster recovery (BCDR) plan. If you already account for them in your business plan, kudos to you! I recently wrote about how to go about this for the Hartford Business Journal and have included more detail below. When putting together a BCDR plan, I think many of us focus on the more typical potential disasters that come to mind like weather, human, and data related incidents. When gathering my thoughts for this, I even subconsciously put pandemic last when listing out types of plans to consider making. Did you have a plan in place that’s helped get your business through this crisis?