DISASTER MANAGEMENT PLAN

Disaster Management Plan

Disaster Management Plan

Introduction

Referring to the Data recovery system at XYZ Insurance company and setting up an appropriate contingent disaster recovery plan the most important step is to consider firstly the centralized computer system which can now be replaced with or connected to the distributed systems. Also, multiple servers are connected to each other on a corporate network to balance their processing power. If one of the servers in the networked environment crashes, troubles will arise for both the users and the company. There are a variety of reasons that cause systems to crash. For example, the lack of system security and employee sabotage are the main concerns. While computer hackers live outside of the company walls, this is not always the case. Although passwords and firewalls help keep viruses and intruders from entering the corporate systems, sometimes they are useless. Corporate management needs to recognize the necessity for data security.

A disaster could cause companies an interruption for a period of time. The Business Recovery Plan is the document used to assist an organization in recovering its business functions. A Disaster Recovery Plan (DRP), however, is a document designed to assist an organization in recovering from data losses and restoring data assets. A DRP should be a pro-active document, a living and breathing document. It does not document the tasks, it is an action plan that is used to identify a set of policies, procedures, and resources that are used to monitor and maintain corporate information technology (IT) before, during, and after the disaster. Possible IT disasters include (Semer, 1998):

natural disasters, such as fires, earthquakes, lightning, storms, and static electricity;

software malfunctions;

hardware or system malfunctions;

power outages;

computer viruses;

man-made threats, such as vandalism, hackers, and sabotage; and

human error, such as improper computer shutdown, spilling liquids on the computer, and cigarette ash.

Body

Disaster recovery was a term coined by computer vendors between 1960 and 1980 - the era of the centralized mainframe computer (Colraine, 1998). During that time, a disaster recovery plan was used to backup mainframe computers.

A disaster recovery plan was similar to an insurance policy that provided a protection from natural disasters, such as earthquakes, floods, hurricanes, and tornadoes. Disaster recovery plans during these years were typically used by organizations that have large mainframe computers and data sites for daily business operations. Since data recovery planning process was expensive, an alternative was to backup the data from the mainframe computer and store it at alternate locations. During the 1970s, providing backup data services was a lucrative business.

According to the third annual information security survey conducted by Information Week and Ernst & Young, nearly half of the more than 1,290 respondents representing information systems chiefs and security managers suffered security-related financial losses in the past two years (Panettieri, 1995).

Most companies hesitate to develop a disaster recovery plan until a disaster occurs.

Benefits and cost of disaster recovery plans

Corporate decision makers must look at every aspect of a DRP before implementing it within their ...