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It has become crucial these days, in addition to having all the necessary protections implemented in your system, to also have a disaster recovery plan ready in the event of an attack. A Disaster Recovery as a Service (DRaaS) solution is convenient because it is managed by the service provider.
Securing and protecting all data assets in a third-party cloud computing environment enables organizations to avoid downtime that could negatively affect businesses and their reputation.
To select the right DRaaS solution for your business, you need to consider a number of factors. We spoke to several industry professionals to get their perspective on the subject.
Markus Bauer, Senior Technology Evangelist, Acronis
Whether your organization is a small business or a large global enterprise, the loss of critical data can cause tremendous damage. Today, every business depends on IT and data. Choosing the right disaster recovery software or service could mean the difference between success and failure if something were to happen.
There is no one-size-fits-all disaster recovery solution. Disaster recovery solutions are all different and there are certain aspects that should be taken into account to ensure that they are the best fit for your business and your needs. This includes things like destination options:
- Local data center: With this, business-critical data is stored offsite in a physical location, but disaster recovery can take days or weeks. This is also the more expensive option as you also have to consider the “environmental†cost like power and cooling.
- Cloud: Cloud-based disaster recovery is the most cost-effective, flexible and scalable option. Disaster recovery in the cloud enables an organization to keep entire environments ready, reducing recovery time from business disruption or failure to minutes or even seconds.
- Hybrid: This option offers the highest degree of flexibility, reduces costs and meets all regulatory and compliance needs.
There are pros and cons for each, which is why it is so important to assess what is best for your business. Also, remember that backup is not disaster recovery.
Peter Groucutt, Managing Director, Databarracks
The main question to answer if you are looking for a DRaaS solution is’ what does’ as a service ‘mean to me? ”
This can mean consuming the resources on a pay-as-you-go basis. Some DRaaS providers offer access to the technology on a pay-as-you-go basis, but leave the management and recovery to you.
It could also mean a fully managed service where your provider monitors the service to make sure you are still meeting your recovery service level agreements (SLAs). In the event of a claim, you call your supplier and they collect everything for you.
Self-service DRaaS inevitably costs less, but we believe there are times when it really pays to get expert help.
When your car breaks down you want a mechanic, when there is a medical emergency you want a paramedic. When you have a major IT disaster, you need disaster recovery experts who take care of recoveries every day.
If you have a ransomware attack, for example, there is a huge advantage in having someone take care of it who has already performed multiple recoveries.
Disaster recovery is ideal for outsourcing. It is repetitive, specialized and requires a pool of qualified experts to be called upon to intervene when necessary. You don’t have to rely on it often, but when you do, it just needs to be okay.
Radhesh Menon, CPO, Datto
Considering the role the cloud plays in backup and recovery, especially DRaaS, the criteria of the cloud itself becomes a priority. Public vs private? With a public cloud, you need to be the administrator who covers everything from the initial definition to ensuring that the data is safe and secure. In addition to administrative overhead, there are compute costs associated with the cloud which can vary widely depending on storage and compute costs.
Specially designed private clouds can offer the benefit of providing all-in-one functionality, which means they can both serve as a backup repository and be used for DRaaS. Since the provider creates and maintains the private cloud, there is no administrative overhead, and when it comes to security, private clouds often include security features like multi-factor authentication, backup files immutable which cannot be corrupted or deleted by malware and many other security elements. layers that would be difficult to duplicate in a “build your own†public cloud scenario.
Last but not least, cost, where a private cloud solution is typically included as part of an all-in-one BCDR solution and has a predictable cost model, public cloud costs can be unpredictable and variable nature.
Rajiv Mirani, Technical Director, Nutanix
Choosing the right DRaaS solution can be a daunting task for IT teams, but when done right, it frees up resources for other business priorities. Selecting a solution that protects your data and applications while meeting compliance requirements, enabling infrastructure flexibility, reducing total cost of ownership, and performing uninterrupted disaster recovery testing is critical.
Compliance should be a priority for IT teams, which is why meeting SLAs for RPO and RTO is critical to minimize downtime and data loss. It’s also important to remember that needs can change as the business grows, so a solution must give organizations the flexibility to expand their disaster recovery and cloud footprint as their business needs grow.
Finally, while not specific to DRaaS, it is also crucial to select a DR solution that allows IT teams to properly and easily test their failover system without disrupting business operations. The alternative often results in companies sporadically testing their systems, leaving them unprepared for disaster and feeling less confident. Simple and consistent testing is essential to ensure business continuity and peace of mind.
W. Curtis Preston, Chief Technical Evangelist, Druva
With massive amounts of data being generated every day, the impact of data loss from a ransomware attack, human error, or system failure can be crippling. A reliable DRaaS solution will make the difference between your business surviving or going out of business the moment a failure occurs. At the start of your search, start by evaluating the following criteria:
Air-gap by design: The only way to mitigate the risk of data loss is to use a solution that can offer a digital air gap. This will ensure that no one with access to your production environment will be able to delete or modify your backups as well. It will be essential to protect against ransomware.
Instant one-click recovery: Enabling disaster recovery should be possible with the click of a mouse. Ask your potential disaster recovery provider how long it will take between the time you report a disaster and the time the applications are up and running and users can log on.
Automated tests: It is important to know if your solution is correctly configured before you need to use it. The only way to do this is to do frequent testing. Choose a solution that offers automated testing – it won’t disrupt day-to-day operations and you don’t have to rely on IT staff to manually verify system configurations.
Chris Rogers, Technology Evangelist, Zerto
Disaster recovery (DR) is one of the most vital parts of any IT organization. Understanding the need for disaster recovery and being able to come up with an effective and robust strategy can seem far removed from each other. This is where DRaaS revolutionized this industry.
DRaaS enables organizations to become disaster recovery specialists overnight with the help of a service provider, and enables OPEX spending rather than having large CAPEX investments.
To consider:
SLA and metrics
Make sure that your choice of DRaaS provider can meet critical SLAs such as recovery point object and recovery time target. These will be critical in defining the success of a disaster recovery scenario and can mean the difference between a minor disruption and irreparable damage to a business.
Operating model
Choose an operating model that matches your needs. It could be a fully managed service, a self-managed offering, or somewhere in between. Understanding your organization’s requirements and potential gaps will help you evaluate different DRaaS offerings and find the one that fits your disaster recovery strategy perfectly.
Added value
Don’t assume it’s just for the worst case scenarios. See if you can use the service for additional use cases like patch testing, vulnerability scanning, or even burst capability. These additional ways of using the service will allow organizations to get the most out of the money they spend on DRaaS.
Ahsan Siddiqui, Director, Product Management, Arcserve
DRaaS is typically delivered on the basis of a Service Level Agreement (SLA) that allows you to choose the specific structure you need to meet the thresholds and requirements of your disaster recovery (DR) plan. This should include your recovery time goal (RTO) and recovery point goal (RPO).
Your DRaaS solution should allow you to customize your cloud storage to suit your needs, whether your IT environment is small and simple, or large and complex. You should be able to easily control your cloud settings and count on predictable monthly pricing.
It is also essential to ensure that your DRaaS provider can offer guaranteed uptime. Maximizing availability to nearly 100% requires a highly distributed, fault-tolerant disaster recovery cloud. This means you can be confident that your data will be there when you need it, and that you can scale quickly and easily as your needs grow.
An important feature to check when evaluating DRaaS is the ability to recover quickly and transparently; So, look for a one-click failover feature that lets you configure the sequence, order, and recovery time for each critical system, and gives you the option to start a scale-up failover (or test) process. of the site at the push of a button.
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