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By: Daniel Scarafia , Regional Director Hitachi Vantara Latin America
On the recent October 4, 2021, more than 3 billion people around the world were completely disconnected from their digital routines for more than seven long hours, in what has been the biggest blackout we have seen on social media. For many, the situation did not go beyond just missing the activities of their friends and family, not being able to access the services of WhatsApp, Facebook and Instagram.
However, for a number no less than individuals, I would dare to say hundreds of thousands, this \ Digital Blackout \ meant the fall of communication in their companies, the inability to transmit key messages, and ultimately, incalculable losses in management and productivity.
The first lesson that must be internalized after this unforeseen global scale is that there is no technological giant that is immune to a fall. Anyone, and at any time, can experience an interruption in their service, which can leave thousands, and even millions of affected by the drift.
Therefore, the second lesson is that, in order to maintain the operation and the normal flow of communication, information and data within a company, a diversified technological architecture must be adopted that allows the development of contingency plans capable of guaranteeing continuity. of the business.
Currently, to avoid this type of critical complexities, the most widely used and recommended technological architecture model at the business level is the Hybrid Cloud , in which one or more Public Cloud providers interact with the infrastructure installed locally in the company. ( on premise ), which may involve Data Centers and Private Clouds.
In this configuration, the operation of the applications can move between the various infrastructures, allowing that in the event of a contingency, the loads are distributed and operational continuity can be guaranteed with the least possible lag.
Obviously, the benefits of mobilizing data and applications to the Cloud are numerous, but not infallible, and as in financial matters, diversification is essential to reduce risk. In the IT industry this logic is exactly the same.
If I had to make three recommendations when designing the IT architecture on which the business operation and its critical processes will rest, the first is that the risk of possible failures should always be diversified , allowing applications and data to move between various systems in a fluid and permanent way. This will contribute to maintaining operational continuity in as many contingencies as possible, from natural disasters to cyberattacks, human errors, etc.
The second is to safeguard the digital capital of companies , that is, data. You must always keep control of the information, whether to retrieve it, replicate it, extract it and process it at any time that is required. It is not advisable to depend on 100% external technology for the operation of our company.
Meanwhile, the third recommendation is that, in addition to diversifying the operation of the processes, and maintaining control of the data at all times, it will always be necessary to design a protection and recovery system that can be accessed quickly to restart the system. . This should not be conceived as a high-security safe that has so many complexities to access that it makes it very slow to recover what is saved, but rather as a continuous protection solution that allows rapid recovery in case of emergencies.
Finally, today it is possible to have hybrid architectures capable of avoiding drops and interruptions in services and business operation. Adopting them implies a forward-looking, responsible decision, and in the long term, economically efficient.
