Disaster Recovery Planning Template

Disaster Recovery Planning Template

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Disaster Recovery
Plan Template


 
Disaster Recovery Planning Template 

Security Manual

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No, it needn't be difficult. Much of a disaster recovery planning initiative is common sense. The rest is greatly simplified through simple to use proven tools and templates.   This Disaster Recovery Planning Template was use by consultants who created the Disaster Recovery Plan and Business Resumption plan that Merrill Lynch used after 9/11.

This site is designed to catalog the easiest yet most effective approaches and products... to make disaster recovery planning less of a trauma and more of a business process.

The creation of the plan itself is the first port of call, but we also examine contingency audit and Sarbanes-Oxley compliance from a management perspective.

 

Disaster Recovery Plan

Disaster Recovery Audit

Risk analysis is inextricably linked with disaster recovery. Assessment of the risks which may lead to disaster is essential in the determination of what controls are appropriate to the situation. Again, however, risk analysis is often made more difficult than necessary.

Do you really need a complicated piece of software to create your plan? Do you need 20 years experience in business continuity planning? Do you need to divert untold resources into the plan creation exercise? Certainly, if you employ the Disaster Recovery Planning Template the answer is... NO!

 


How do you ensure that your disaster recovery plan meets your actual needs? How do you know that it will all work? Do you audit it, and if so, how?

Equally fundamentally, do you know what your resource/service dependencies are and what their time criticalities are? What of your actual everyday contingency practices - do they measure up?

To determine and ensure all of this with minimum fuss, a comprehensive but extremely simple to use product is now available.... the Disaster Recovery Toolkit - Business and IT Impact Analysis

 

Threat / Vulnerability

Disaster Recovery Planning News

 

Risk analysis is inextricably linked with disaster recovery. assessment of the risks which may lead to disaster is essential in the determination of what controls are appropriate to the situation. Again, however, risk analysis is often made more difficult than necessary.

The Threat & Vulnerability Assessment Tool Kit and tool was designed to simplify matters, and to make risk analysis more widely accessible through automation. It is now probably the most widely used product and method in the world

Further Information

For more information on disaster recovery plans and business continuity we are pleased to introduce our online IT Productivity Center.


07/26/2010 Government employees continue to breach privacy of individuals -

According to Gazette.net, a Maryland Department of Human Resources employee has been fired for posting about 3,000 names, Social Security numbers and other personal information on his personal website.

The information, which belonged to department clients who use food stamps, housing programs and other social services provided by the state, had been posted on the employee's website since April 27. The site has since been removed and there is no indication that the information has been misused.

The Baltimore Sun reports that a DHR spokeswoman, says it is unclear why he used the data in an unauthorized way.

The incident is still under investigation and no decision has been made yet about whether criminal charges will be filed.

 more info
   

07/24/2010 Record Management Needs to Include Email -

As the importance of IT, the Internet, SmartPhones, and email has grown, its legal status has changed with far-reaching consequences. A variety of laws and regulations have been extended to cover all business records, including email and all communications in both public and private sectors. Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) and other mandates requirements touch almost every facet of paper and electronic data.

Among other provisions, SOX requires companies to maintain “all audit or review work papers” for at least five years. For registered public accounting firms, the period is at least seven years. Penalties for noncompliance include severe fines and even imprisonment, and intentionally altering or destroying records can bring even more serious consequences.

Consider that most work papers and records are created as emails and may never exist in physical form. An email can be deleted in violation of SOX at the click of a mouse. Key considerations for ensuring your company meets SOX record-keeping requirements include:

  • Can employees reliably distinguish ordinary emails from protected business records?
  • Are you be certain that employees are  storing the protected emails for the required time period?
  • Is there a process in place for storing physical copies of every protected business records and emails?
  • Are  you certain that no one is hacking into your email system and maliciously changing records?
 more info
   

07/13/2010 Wi-Fi needs to be secure -

Security Manual - 
Sarbanes-OxleyYou can secure your wireless network in little time with these 5 simple rules:

  • Secure your access point administration interface: The default passwords of most standard devices are already known to most hackers. So, when you set up your router through the web interface, change the default password and write it down somewhere safe.
  • Stop broadcasting your SSID: Your wireless router continuously transmits your SSID (Service Set Identifier). While this is useful in an office where many people are going to connect to your network, at home this is certainly not needed. Turn SSID transmission off as soon as you can. Wireless LAN "sniffers" will still be able to detect your network, but other than that, your network will mostly be shrouded from outsiders.
  • Use MAC address filtering: Turn on MAC address filtering on your wireless router configuration utility. By doing so, you can add the MAC addresses of all of your networking devices to the address pool of the router. This way, no one outside your home network will be able to access your network.
  • Reduce the power of transmission: Reduce the power of your wireless transmitter to such a degree that the signal does not reach outside your faciltiy or home. This will keep most outsiders at bay.
  • Disable remote administration tool: Your remote administration utility is seldom used. So, keeping it on exposes your network to outsiders. Turn it off for enhance your network security.
 more info
   

06/22/2010 Feds to spend billion on cybersecurity research -

As the Obama administration and Congress propose various measures to improve the nation’s cybersecurity, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence is planning to spend "multiple billions of dollars" on cybersecurity research.

The deputy director of national intelligence for acquisition and technology, said at a recent cybersecurity summit sponsored by Defense Daily that her office, together with the White House Office of Science and Technology, will be sponsoring "innovative" research addressing three areas, the Washington Post reported:

  • Multiple security levels for government and non-government organizations.
  • Security systems that change constantly to create moving targets for hackers.
  • Methods to motivate individuals to improve their cybersecurity practices.
 more info
   

06/18/2010 Disaster Recovery / Business Continuity is Not the Place to Cut Costs -

In today's business environment, many enterprises are looking for way  to reduce their expenses by cutting overhead. Often this takes the form of reducing headcount, particularly in areas that are regarded as ancillary or non-core components of the enterprise.

Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity often are placed in that category and, as a result, can be an early casualty of many cost-cutting programs. Whether it is an internal Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity  team losing staff members, or a part-time Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity manager with less time to spare from the day job, Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity programs can be neglected and will quickly become out of date and ineffective, particularly in a rapidly changing organization. As anyone who has ever had to manage a Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity event knows, there are few things more useless than an out of date Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity plan.

Of course, it is hard to make a case for Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity at a time when core functions are under pressure, but maybe that is just when it should be on the radar even more than usual. With share prices shaky and credit hard to find, the last thing any organization needs right now is the damage to its reputation and credibility that could arise from failing to effectively manage a high profile disruptive incident.

Arguably, during a recession companies are at their most vulnerable, which makes it the worst time to neglect anything, which contributes to resilience or reduces risk. However, if an organization is under financial pressure, how can it square the circle and achieve those reductions in overhead costs while still maintaining the effectiveness of its Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity program.

 more info
   

 

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