An information and communication technology (ICT) is an all inclusive term for all information processing and communication activities. It covers digital technologies used in communication (protocols, equipment and media) as also techniques for information processing and storing (computing software, hardware and data storage). The term has been coined due to the amalgamating effect of information technology (IT) and telecom technology. In today’s business and economic spheres, all activities have been influenced by ICT in the form of quick and global access. The outcome is economic growth of the society.
Software-As-A-Service or SaaS has emerged to be a great ICT tool. In the Software-as-a-Service, the vendor supplies the hardware infrastructure, the software product and interacts through a front-end interface with the client. This model can help businesses to deliver new products and services quicker and at a lower cost. Investing in software as a service (SaaS) could help businesses operate with lower costs by providing back and front office business functions and help them grow in spite of the present global economic recession. The SaaS model has already becoming popular with many software companies and application providers offering databases, project management, CRM and human resource applications. Organizations opting for SaaS save due to less application expense and implementation costs. Users do not have to pay for hardware, installation and maintenance charges, software licensing charges and the cost of IT infrastructure in the form of expert human resource needed to administer systems. SaaS offers pay-as-you-use pricing that allows organizations to use cutting-edge technology without installing, upgrading, maintaining or securing those systems. SaaS is particularly beneficial to growing businesses in countries with underdeveloped infrastructure, stringent capital budgets and limited resources as SaaS services take care of all these constraints. Today, SaaS offers human resources, accounting, procurement, billing, customer relationship management (CRM), sales and marketing, enterprise resource planning (ERP), and business intelligence (BI) services. Leasing costs vary a great deal depending on the type of service. SaaS services usually have a lower total cost of ownership to start with, because they do not require large capital investment in software licenses or hardware support infrastructure. But later on, on-premises cost decreases as the capital assets depreciate while the SaaS operating cost remains constant. So growing or newly-launched businesses now have a choice of hosted services at their disposal, only to be accessed through a web browser and a secure internet connection.

SaaS has thus emerged as a formidable asset for the ICT sector services.

Server failure is a major disaster in any organization. The magnitude of the failure can range from disk failure to critical system device failure. The former requires installation of new disks after which backups are restored. The latter may necessitate deployment of new hardware, whose configuration may be different to that which it is going to replace. Server restoration on a different hardware poses some problems.
To minimize downtime due to server failure in mission critical datacenters, implementation of failover/standby/backup server(s) is possible. This scenario provides quick restoration. One solution is to have two servers that are identical, both systems running together. Same hardware in both the main server and backup server is needed. Synchronization between the two servers must be done so as to restore any data changes on the main server to the backup server. Hardware synchronization is also necessary in the form of identical hardware updates. It is costly to maintain both servers from a maintenance and backup perspective. In situations where more than one mission critical server exists, the maintenance and backup costs become prohibitive. Added to the maintenance requirements of such server systems is the constraint to deploy hardware with identical configuration, which may not be easily available. Outsourcing the disaster recovery solution to a vendor that specializes in virtual machine technology overcomes this problem.
The virtual machine technology enables multiple operating systems to run concurrently on a single machine. Virtualization increases the efficiency and the effectiveness of the disaster recovery process and offers cost-savings opportunities. Virtualization is hardware-agnostic; systems can be restored without identical or near-identical hardware. This creates flexibility and expands options regarding the type of hardware one can recover to.
Disaster recovery can be implemented with hardware that need not be identical to the primary server. The standby server with server virtualization makes restoration of an entire server an easy process. With virtualization, restoring a server is as simple as retrieving a copy of the virtual machine’s image files and restoring them. This alone could reduce recovery time from hours or days to minutes.
The virtual server software hides the physical hardware from the virtual servers. The virtual server software creates a generic hardware platform that’s consistent, regardless of the physical hardware used to host the virtual servers. This simplifies the “bare metal” restore process, because it is possible to perform a bare metal install on dissimilar hardware
An organization with a number of servers must adopt a backup system, to ensure business continuity following a system crash, with the backup provider employing virtualization technologies.

The two most common applications that run on Windows Servers are Microsoft Exchange Server and MS-SQL Server. Other common types of Windows Server are domain controller, Active Directory, and Web Server. The servers may be running Windows 2008 or Windows 2003 or even Windows 2000.
Bare Metal Recovery technology is able to quickly recover an unusable system. It can restore both system and data in a single pass, eliminating the need for multiple backups and significantly reducing downtimes. Bare-metal restore is a technique where the backed up data is available in a form which allows one to restore a computer system from “bare metal”, i.e. without any requirements as to previously installed software or operating system. Typically, the backed up data include the necessary operating system, applications and data components to rebuild or restore the backed up system to an entirely separate piece of hardware. Bare-metal differs from the local disk image restore and the simple data backup. The local disk image restores from a copy of the disk image and the software performing the restore is invoked by booting the server with the setup/installation disk. Windows server backup supplied with the OS is not designed to be an enterprise-level solution. The simple data backups only the application data, but neither the applications nor Windows itself are backed up or restored. Bare metal restore for rebuilding a server from ground up is offered by many disaster recovery solution providers. Enterprise-level disaster recovery solutions nowadays deploy server virtualization technology.

A mirror image of the client’s complete system is created using a separate storage device. The device is then taken to the data center of the vendor and stored as a virtual server on the datacenter servers. The virtual server software hides the physical hardware from the virtual servers. The virtual server software creates a generic hardware platform that’s consistent, regardless of the actual physical hardware used to host the virtual servers. This simplifies the bare metal restore process, because the hardware platform is always consistent. Virtual servers appear as files on the host server, so to perform a bare metal restore, all that is to be done is to restore the virtual server image files.

Before virtualization, one had to maintain a one-to-one relationship between the production servers and the standby servers. Using virtualization, one can replicate five production servers on a single server running multiple instances of a virtual operating system.

The applications deployed on Windows Servers are Microsoft Exchange Server, MS-SQL Server, Domain Controller, Active Directory, and Web Server on Windows 2008 or Windows 2003 or even Windows 2000 operating systems.
If the servers are part of an enterprise business IT system, these may employ various storage systems. The three basic storage systems are direct attached storage (DAS), storage area network (SAN) and network attached storage (NAS). NAS is used where a DAS is unable to meet enterprise storage needs. NAS is used only for file-sharing; this means that the DAS in the server can be used for application sharing. This improves data access for multiple clients over the network. NAS also offers data protection features such as replication and mirroring. SANs are implemented for mission-critical applications. They provide a high performance network for data transfer between servers and storage devices. SAN greatly facilitates database, image and transaction processing.
An organization with a number of Windows servers must adopt an offsite backup system, to ensure business continuity following a system crash. Such an offsite data backup company should be employing data deduplication and virtualization technologies. Choosing a reliable and efficient backup service provider makes the IT organization simple and efficient.
Offsite data backup offers many features, more common of them being,
Username/password based authentication, encryption of data according to Advanced Encryption Standards (AES), support for fast backups after the initial backup using advanced incremental backup technologies, compressed backups to help conserve end user’s bandwidth, automated backup that does not involve user intervention, Open file backups, data versioning to help users retrieve their files as of different backups, backup versioning where at least 10 to 30 copies of user data is maintained and Web-based central management console. Less common but more specific to Windows Servers are support for MS SQL Server/Exchange Server backup, this being an enterprise class requirement where customers are looking for a cost-effective online backup solution that can take over the online backup of their databases without bringing the databases down during the process. High-end LAN-based backup systems may also offer services such as near-real-time transaction-level replication and continuous data protection (CDP).
With the Windows servers running mission-critical applications, the backup solution should be such that in case of a failure, these can be restored in minimum amount of time. This is possible if the offsite backup provider uses virtual machine technology. Virtualization increases the efficiency and the effectiveness of the disaster recovery process and offers cost-savings opportunities.

Remote data backup provides data protection for multiple remotely located computers, which can be servers, workstations or laptops. Remote online backup services are secure and bandwidth-efficient for enterprises and their branch offices. Nowadays many companies allow their employees to work outside the company offices at their convenience. This arrangement is called teleworking and is governed by a law designed to establish telework policies. The law was devised to promote flexibility, reduce physical office space requirements and make jobs more attractive to candidates. An additional reason for telework policies was to guard against a pandemic outbreak, terrorist attack or any other disasters. Since 2000, the rise in the number of laptops, broadband and Wi-Fi connections in homes, Webmail accounts for e-mail, and Web portals for remote access have made teleworking more convenient and feasible than ever.

IT managers who ensure that all agency data inside the office is being regularly backed up must attach the same importance to the data being created and accessed remotely by teleworkers and remote offices. The online backup services must be able to recover data and applications instantly, including data on remote devices. Present recovery solutions make it easy to restore remote data to “any point in time.” Today’s restoration technology provided by the online backup services enables IT staff to manage the remote backup and recovery process from any desktop, laptop or Pocket PC. Within a company’s environment, there is generally a backup system in place to guard against data loss. For remote offices who have a persistent connection to the central network through a VPN or remote-access software, same backup procedure can be followed which are in force at the main office. For isolated laptops or workstations of teleworkers, IT managers might consider web-based storage services. There are vendors who provide backup services in several ways. As software a company buys to backup its remote users, as a hosted service or as an online service for individual users. In the first two options, the software gather information from the machines of the remote users whenever the users connect to the internet or have IP connection established. In case of the hosted option, data is stored in the vendor’s offsite server. For network-connected users, their data is backed up as part of the central network. For those that dial in, the data from their computers is uploaded to the central network each time they connect.

The most common causes of data loss are hardware failure, human error and natural calamities. Although the probability is small, the only way to recover from data loss due to a natural disaster is to store backup data in a physically separate location. File system corruption can frequently be repaired by the system administrator with proper software tools. Deleted files in most occasions can be successfully recovered. Data loss due to hardware failure can never be foreseen and forestalled. There are commercial services that attempt to recover data from physically damaged media, but there is no guarantee of a successful recovery and the cost incurred is prohibitively high. The cost of a data loss event is directly proportional to the value of the data and the length of time of unavailability when required, and results in financial loss, tarnished business image and in an extreme case dissolution of the business activity. Businesses nowadays have to protect data at all costs.

Successful recovery from a data loss event requires an effective backup strategy. It primarily depends on the type of the business segment. Your backup needs may range from simple data backup to server backup with virtualization. Whatever may be the requirement, hosted disaster recovery services are available which are specifically tailored to meet it.

Hosted disaster recovery services in the form of online data backup provides advanced data protection, combining data backup and offsite storage into a single automated process. With online backup, data is instantly offsite with no additional infrastructure outlay or extra hardware costs. For more aggressive disaster recovery plans, such as critical file system and database backup, continuous data protection (CDP) is available.

Enterprise-level disaster recovery solutions often require server virtualization as a prime option. Virtualization increases the efficiency and the effectiveness of the disaster recovery process with savings in cost. An online disaster recovery service which hosts server virtualization can temporarily take over the job of the client’s production servers till such time that these are back in action, thereby almost eliminating any appreciable downtime. Choosing a disaster recovery service provider that provides virtualization will allow an organization to create cost and energy efficient IT environments.

Hosted disaster recovery services either charge per GB of data, per GB of storage or per device of storage. Usually, no charge for the online backup software (which comes free and forms the essence of the SaaS model) is levied. Charges are on basis of the monthly/annual subscription cost of using the service.

Installation of some sort of disaster recovery system is a must for all business houses. While selecting one of these, one can opt for one of the hosted disaster recovery systems, or may go for more traditional methods of disaster recovery solution like, in-house data backup.

Most in-house systems use a variety of backup devices like tape drives, external drives, or optical disks like CD or DVD. Tapes are notoriously unreliable and are hardly verifiable. Even if you get a successful backup, it does not necessarily mean you will be able to correctly restore the backed up data, Tapes can be used only for full backup, are badly transportable and must be stored under special conditions. Backups stored on an external drive don’t provide protection from natural causes like theft or fire. An external drive can crash or become corrupt due to power outages or administrative errors and can even be misplaced. CD and DVD discs are compact, inexpensive and have very suitable capacity for regular backups. But if really large sets of data (e.g. HDD image backup) are to be backed up, changing and numbering multiple discs may appear very tiresome and error-prone. Vulnerability of CD/DVD backup is the same as that of hard disks. The inability to recover critical information, and that also in the shortest time, necessary to run the business can cripple a company in today’s business environment.

Hosted disaster recovery solutions score over the traditional method on many points. The more obvious are,
1. No additional hardware and software for backup to be purchased. No cost to be incurred for purchase of backup media. No software maintenance in the form of upgrade, bugs, license costs.
2. No need to transport the backed-up media to offsite for safe storage incurring additional costs and inconvenience.
3. No possibility of theft and loss of your confidential business data.
4. Quick and error-free data restore resulting in minimum business downtime.
These services free up business resources in the form of cash and reduced IT staff, which can be gainfully employed in improving the company infrastructure in other areas. The more common features offered by most hosted DR recovery services are data encryption, data compression to save bandwidth, incremental backup and backing up of regularly used applications. High-end features may include continuous data protection (CDP), database backup, multiple OS backup and server virtualization which can temporarily take over the job of the client’s production servers.

For safe, secure, automated data backup and fast restores, hosted DR recovery services should be preferred.

Enterprise-level businesses are nowadays employing virtual server technologies. To reduce cost, save space and simplify IT infrastructure.
Virtualization technology enables businesses to run multiple applications and operating systems on the same server. Reducing the number of physical servers decreases power, cooling and maintenance costs, and provides more computing power in less floor area. When selecting a remote backup provider for top-class disaster recovery solutions, server virtualization is regarded as the prime requirement. A remote backup service that provides virtualization for disaster recovery will allow an organization to enjoy cost and energy efficient IT environments. Virtualization technologies deployed as a feature of online backup service can reduce the amount of hardware required and simplify recovery operations.

Online backup providers implement a simplified disaster recovery solution using virtual technologies which result in a much lower overall cost. The concept of using virtualization in a disaster recovery environment is very critical. Till the advent of server virtualization, it has been expensive to get one server to replicate to the other because those two servers had to be basically identical. In order for them to be identical, the same hardware had to be used in both the main and backup locations. With virtualization, those hardware costs are cut down significantly because of the ability to host several machines on one server. This is made possible because the virtual server software hides the physical hardware from the virtual servers, by creating a generic hardware platform that is independent of the physical hardware used to host the virtual servers. This result in a simplified “bare metal” restore, because the hardware platform is always consistent.

The online backup solution should be such that, each workload running on a physical server can replicate and failover to a dedicated virtual machine on a single physical server, eliminating the need to deploy and manage multiple physical servers at the recovery site. In a virtual machine at the online backup provider’s end, a number of the client’s physical servers can be protected. The result is a very high level of application protection and availability with a much lower TCO as virtual machine solutions offer improved efficiency and lower IT costs.

Virtualization greatly improves the efficiency and the effectiveness of the disaster recovery process with savings in cost. An online data backup company which hosts server virtualization for disaster recovery can easily take over the job of the client’s production servers till such time that these are back in action, thereby almost eliminating any appreciable downtime.

In the highly competitive business environment of the present day, it is most unfortunate that a significant numbers of SMEs (Small Business Enterprise) do not have a properly laid-out disaster recovery plan (DRP). Though disaster comes in many forms and can never be foreseen and totally avoided, formulating and adhering to such a plan may make the difference between prosperity and oblivion.

One kind of disaster that can be recovered from is data loss. Most businesses nowadays tend to follow the concept of ‘paperless office’, thereby making them extremely vulnerable to data loss to the extent that the survival of the business becomes totally dependent on the computer data. Sadly, computers like any other devices are subject to failure due to any number of reasons.

The plan for disaster recovery from data loss should be integrated to the organization’s crisis management plan. With limited budget, most SMEs may not have a dedicated IT department to perform in-house data recovery. Even those who are in a position to afford it, may base their data recovery system on tape or disk backups. None of these are safe and reliable, while requiring extra outlay in the form of, hardware and software, continuous purchase of storage media, expert and dedicated human intervention, and cost of storage. To protect your business data, you should look to a data backup solution provider.

Backups are now offered as a service by many providers to SMEs desiring to avail a cost-effective, hassle-free, automated, user-friendly, safe and reliable solution to their backup needs. Like any other contracted services, a company can hand over its backup requirements to a backup service provider. Online backup is effective, secure and has very short disaster recovery time.

Upon entering into a contract with a remote backup service provider, a software package is provided to the client to access the remote backup system. Using the software, the client can upload selected data to the provider’s remote server for backing up.

The main advantage of the remote backup service is that it frees up business resources in the form of cash and reduced IT staff, which can be gainfully employed in improving the company infrastructure in other areas. Common features offered by most remote backup service providers are, data encryption and data compression. Special features include ability to back up multiple platforms such as Windows, UNIX and Mac, and database backup.

The most important argument in favor of remote backup is that backups are stored in a different location from that of the original data, thus surviving any disaster that may befall at the latter.

Remote data backup provides data protection for multiple remotely located computers, which can be servers, workstations or laptops. Remote online backup services are secure and bandwidth-efficient for enterprises and their branch offices. Nowadays many companies allow their employees to work outside the company offices at their convenience. This arrangement is called teleworking and is governed by a law designed to establish telework policies. The law was devised to promote flexibility, reduce physical office space requirements and make jobs more attractive to candidates. An additional reason for telework policies was to guard against a pandemic outbreak, terrorist attack or any other disasters. Since 2000, the rise in the number of laptops, broadband and Wi-Fi connections in homes, Webmail accounts for e-mail, and Web portals for remote access have made teleworking more convenient and feasible than ever.

IT managers who ensure that all agency data inside the office is being regularly backed up must attach the same importance to the data being created and accessed remotely by teleworkers and remote offices. The online backup services must be able to recover data and applications instantly, including data on remote devices. Present recovery solutions make it easy to restore remote data to “any point in time.” Today’s restoration technology provided by the online backup services enables IT staff to manage the remote backup and recovery process from any desktop, laptop or Pocket PC. Within a company’s environment, there is generally a backup system in place to guard against data loss. For remote offices who have a persistent connection to the central network through a VPN or remote-access software, same backup procedure can be followed which are in force at the main office. For isolated laptops or workstations of teleworkers, IT managers might consider web-based storage services. There are vendors who provide backup services in several ways. As software a company buys to backup its remote users, as a hosted service or as an online service for individual users. In the first two options, the software gather information from the machines of the remote users whenever the users connect to the internet or have IP connection established. In case of the hosted option, data is stored in the vendor’s offsite server. For network-connected users, their data is backed up as part of the central network. For those that dial in, the data from their computers is uploaded to the central network each time they connect.