IT disasters are becoming all too common. Every year, thousands of companies fall prey to computing failures, costing them potentially millions of dollars in lost revenues. 

However, despite these risks, relatively few firms are prepared. According to data collected by Statista, the majority – around 58 percent – only test their disaster recovery plans once per year, with around a quarter not bothering at all. 

As you might expect, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure when it comes to IT disasters. But what can the average business do to stop them? Let’s take a look. 

Hire a Professional

The first step is to hire a professional who really understands IT disasters and the kind of risks that your enterprise faces. They can identify problems with your current setup and make suggestions for how you might improve. 

For example, professionals can protect your systems by training your other colleagues on safe internet use. They can also create digital barriers between your business’s IT network and the rest of the internet, tracking all packets of information that flow in and out. 

Set Up Firewalls and Cybersecurity

Next, you’ll want to set up firewalls and cybersecurity. 

Firewalls are security systems that prevent unauthorized access of your computer network. They stop parties external to your intranet or private network from directly accessing information without the right permissions. 

Cybersecurity is a much broader field that covers all topics related to computer security.

Firms can boost cybersecurity by prioritizing software updates, controlling access to files on a “need to know” basis and using multi-step authentication. They can also hire specialist firms to monitor their networks in real-time, instantly informing them of developing threats. 

Data Backup Plans

Data backup plans are another powerful tool for avoiding IT disasters. 

A good data backup plan should encompass the following: 

• Onsite backups on your premises 
• Offsite backups via the cloud
• An optimized backup schedule where you continually add freshly-created data to your backup archive
• Backup testing where you check that you can recover your files if your main server goes down
• Organized storage making it easy to recover and relocate files in the event of an emergency. 

IT professionals recommend at least three copies of your data across two storage types (for instance, SSD and HDD). They also suggest keeping at least one copy of your data off-site (usually in the cloud). 

Safe Passwords

Avoiding IT disasters also requires ensuring that every member of your team uses safe passwords. 

Safe passwords have the following characteristics: 

• They aren’t regular words (such as “password” or “mother”)
• They use a combination of letters and numbers
• They are more than 10 characters long
• They are changed regularly
• They have a mixture of upper and lower case letters

Train Employees on Safe IT

Colleagues can put enterprises at risk by following malicious email links or downloading certain files. Hence, you may want to consider hiring a company to train your employees on safe IT. 

Training can prevent security breaches and ensures that the business and its data remain safe.