How Differentiate Disaster Recovery from Storage and Backup Solutions

We tend to see a lot of questions on this so let’s take a moment to see how see how they differ—and how they can work together to benefit a customer’s business.

Cloud storage refers simply to the ability to store data and files in the cloud. One of the greatest benefits of cloud storage is scalability: it provides bottomless storage and complete elasticity—meaning that it can scale up or down as needed to meet changing customer requirements. Data stored in the cloud also offers the advantage of access from anywhere, so customers can get to their files wherever they are, or from whatever application they use. With Microsoft Azure, customers also have the benefit of compatibility with a range of operating systems, so they know it will work regardless of the OS. Finally, on Azure, stored data gets enterprise-grade protection, including redundant storage with multiple copies kept automatically to prevent data loss due to unexpected systems failure.

Backup and disaster recovery also involve storing data, but they are primarily focused on doing so for the purposes of data protection and business continuity. One easy way to think about the difference between backup and disaster recovery is that backup is about making sure customers’ employees don’t lose files that may be accidentally deleted or lost due corruption, while disaster recovery is about making sure the customers doesn’t lose files AND that that they can continue to operate their business seamlessly after an unexpected event impacting their primary site, while they work to restore their systems .

Backups are the best tool for making sure you can restore recent copies of files that are accidentally deleted or lost due to hard drive failure . It is also an important tool for legal discovery—with long-term data retention, you can ensure that customers have access to historical data and files when needed for legal reasons.

Disaster recovery is generally more focused on getting services back up and running fast. For example, a customers might have taken an off-site backup of their files an hour before a fire takes out their company’s application servers. So their files are safe (with the exception of any changes made during the hour since the last backup). But how are they going to get your applications and services back up and running? That is where disaster recovery comes in, by enabling them to restore their files AND their services quickly so they can be back up and running in minutes, instead of hours, days or weeks.

All of these are great tools for that leverage the benefits of the cloud to support productivity and business continuity and a lower cost. When combined, they complement each other, working together as a great way to provide multiple layers of convenience and protection. 

Want to learn more? Get in touch with us today at info@liteglobal.com