In the wake of Superstorm Sandy's distructive path through the Caribbean and the North-East United States, there is a lesson for businesses everywhere about having the ability to maintain business continuity in the wake of such natural disasters … or anything that causes interruption.
Power, internet, phone and numerous other technical services for millions have been cut off in the wake of the storm. In many cases, this will affect the viability of businesses and other organisations to keep providing goods and services, in an age where we place total reliance on technology.
Whilst Sandy is still fresh in everybody's mind, it is a good time for organisations to review just how ready they would be to maintain 'business as usual' in the event of a storm, flood, fire or other disaster.
For example, organisations should always have a backup option for their websites. On Monday, New York-based ISP Datagram lost power, effectively knocking out several high-traffic websites hosted by its data centre including The Huffington Post, Buzzfeed and Gawker.
Staff should also be trained and ready for other eventualities, such as scammers taking advantage of crisis response efforts.
