Safeguarding account holder records is a requirement for all financial institutions. Threats to data are as diverse as terrorist attacks, natural disasters and digital theft. After a major loss of computer records, 43% of institutions never reopen and over half close within two years of the loss*. For small to medium sized banks and credit unions, Business Continuity Planning, commonly known as BCP, can be a costly endeavor.

Several technical and operational factors must be considered when researching and selecting a data back-up and recovery solution. When these issues are examined in detail, virtualization emerges as the clear choice.

Select the lowest-cost, highest-performance backup medium.

Traditionally, magnetic tape dominated the BCP industry, but as the cost of disk space continues to fall, disk-based solutions have become increasingly popular. They offer superior encryption without requiring the delicate storage and frequent replacements of tape solutions. Most recently, virtualization as a back-up medium has become much more accessible. It offers more storage capacity, on and offsite, with fewer maintenance costs at a lower price point.  It is especially favored by small to medium size institutions with minimal technical staff to handle business continuity tasks.

Encrypt and safeguard backed-up data.

Securing sensitive data is more important today than ever. The Financial Modernization Act of 1999, also known as the “Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA),” requires every financial institution to have a security plan to protect the confidentiality and integrity of consumers’ personal information. This means that the methodology you choose for backing up data is crucial to the success of your BCP. Magnetic tape is typically not encrypted, but disk and virtual back-ups offer the benefits of encryption, ensuring tighter security.
Ensure that backed-up data can be restored to various types of hardware. Hardware systems change frequently over time. Critical data must be stored such that it can be easily restored to a variety of hardware systems, now and in the future. Both tape and disk storage are limited to restoration on the same type of hardware and operating system. Only by capturing all information in a virtual environment, below the operating system level, can you restore your entire server, its applications and data into operation-ready mode in a matter of minutes.

Ensure that data backup continues during active recovery.

A recovery and backup solution that allows your institution to handle data recovery in the background, while continuing normal business operations, is ideal. Account holders should not be inconvenienced when doing business with your institution during a recovery phase. A virtual backup can be operational within minutes of a main-server failure, ensuring minimal downtime.

Maintain technical resource requirements for a 24/7 data backup solution.

Understanding, designing, implementing and maintaining a backup system is a highly skilled practice. Additional staff with the skills and experience to execute a backup and recovery plan might be necessary, especially for small to midsized institutions. Outsourcing can be an attractive alternative, considering the impact on your ROI after calculating the costs of additional staff, equipment, maintenance and storage.

Virtual backup offers myriad benefits over other methods of data archiving. It is highly cost effective and has a lower instance of data loss than magnetic tape. It also provides a more secure archiving method than tape back-up. When taking into account the overall cost of a data backup solution, it is equally important to consider security and longevity. The ability to back up and restore data in nearly real-time provides your institution with a technological edge that your customers will appreciate.  Real-time recovery means that your clients won’t notice a disruption in service and your institution can carry on normal business operations without interruption.

Bluepoint offers the only Virtual Backup and Disaster Recovery solution to financial institutions that provides simple backup and restore, full virtualization and off-site backup storage in a hands off model, all at an affordable price. Click here to visit the product page.

*Cummings, Maeve; Haag, Stephen; and McCubbrey, Donald. 2003. Management information systems for the information age. http://highered.mcgrawhill.com/sites/0072935863/information_center_view0/