Hurricane season is here, are you prepared?

When I blogged a couple of months ago about getting ready for Hurricane season (http://cnsgfl.blogspot.com/2010/04/calm-before-storm.html), how many of you took to heart what I wrote and put together a plan in case of a disaster? I am guessing not that many of you took action so; I am going to remind you again that hurricanes create a number of challenges for Florida businesses. One of the biggest of these challenges being data protection and recovering your data after a disaster. High level data protection can be very expensive and out of reach for many small businesses, leaving them in a difficult position if they don’t have a defined backup and recovery plan in place. When a hurricane hits, many companies will face the possibility of losing all of their critical data – potentially putting them out of business. A large percentage of companies that experience data loss never recover from the experience. It is crucial that different options exist for emergency situations. After all, there are some cases where businesses think they are completely protected, but emergencies still cause problems.

With hurricane season upon us here are our recommendations which will help keep your data and ultimately your business protected.

• Make sure all of your uninterruptible power supplies (UPS) or battery back-ups have been maintained and the batteries are fully charged.
• UPS’ on servers must be 1500VA or larger.
• Be sure data back-ups are current and are stored off-site.
• Speak with your current IT provider to create a back-up and recovery plan.

If you feel you have fallen short in any of these areas, contact CNSG right away. Don’t wait until a hurricane hits because by then it’s too late. By addressing this ahead of time you will save yourself a tremendous amount of time and money. As your true partner, we at CNSG want to make sure you are prepared in case of a hurricane or other disaster.