Global Data Vault

The importance of maintaining databases

May 15, 2013 by tperot Leave a Comment

If you’re in business, then its likely you’ve got a database such as Exchange, SharePoint and SQL, and all the responsibility (and sometimes headaches) that goes along with owning one. Without proper maintenance, in time, your applications dependent on these databases will slow and employees will have difficulty completing tasks. Those frustrations lead to a loss in productivity and a greater use of resources to accomplish every day operations.

Keeping a database operating smoothly requires routine maintenance:

Image courtesy of renjith krishnan/ FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Looking for signs of corruption from a hardware fault, 3^rd party driver or firmware, or platform issues
Reorganizing the database to remove old and deleted data and logs
Managing and reviewing log files to trace odd program behavior or system access events
Cleaning up leftover maintenance data by removing unneeded files allows your database to respond faster
Rebuilding indexes regularly. Over time, index fragmentation can lead to gaps in data pages and logical fragmentation, which in turn leads to increased disk I/O and latency.
Deleting historical data related to backup and restore activities to help your database to run more efficiently
Backup your database regularly in order to recover from upgrades that don’t play nice, corrupted tables and other system problems that can lead to full-on disasters [Read more...]

Filed Under: Disaster Recovery Tagged With: database maintenance, Disaster Recovery Planning, Exchange, SQL

Cyber attacks with exploits can affect everyone’s data

May 6, 2013 by tperot Leave a Comment

In part one of our Cyber Attack series, we highlighted the massive DDoS attack raining on spam list provider SpamHaus. In most DDoS attacks, your data is likely safe, but the nefarious activities are just one step away from more serious forms of cyber attacks that can steal your data and start with what’s called “exploits.”

These “exploits” are packets of computer code that allow hackers to sneak in and sometimes control computers running software with a known design flaw or a “vulnerability.” Criminals, terrorist groups and even governments are all likely customers for the purchase of exploits.

It’s an emerging market for companies who discover new vulnerabilities called “zero day exploits” in software and sell their findings for anywhere from tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars. And generally it’s legal to sell them. In fact, more than half of exploits sold are now bought from upstanding firms and not hackers, according to the magazine The Economist. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Data Security Tagged With: cyber attacks, Data Security, exploits

Common types of cyber attacks and how they can affect your data

April 30, 2013 by tperot Leave a Comment

Image respectfully borrowed from http://bit.ly/KAuhLE

The first installment in our continuing series examining cyber attacks and how to protect your data.

The rate and intensity of the cyber attacks is escalating and probably affecting your internet activity and you don’t even know it. (Read more.)

In late March, spam-fighting organization Spamhaus was the target of a massive DDoS (distributed denial of service) attack and it was considered the most severe attack since the invention of the Internet – or at least that anyone is admitting to.

It was called, “the worst cyber attack ever.” And there’s more to come. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Data Security Tagged With: cyber attack, ddos, spamhaus

Southern California Payroll Company Averts Disaster with Advanced Data Protection from Global Data Vault

April 11, 2013 by tperot Leave a Comment

Payroll is a daunting, time-consuming task for companies. Oftentimes the entire payroll function is outsourced to a provider to handle the calculations for taxes, the filings, and the actual distribution of funds.

Payroll service companies carry an important responsibility for their clients. Companies depend on them to be reliable as paychecks are pretty important to employees who expect their checks on time; their lives hang in the balance if they don’t get paid. Employees will quit if their money doesn’t show up when promised. Ensuring those payroll systems run without interruption is mission critical for the payroll company, their clients and the employees they serve. One glitch in the system can literally affect thousands of people’s lives.

Payroll is particularly time sensitive because funds have to move and are subject to bank cutoff times, there is very little wiggle room to keep a payroll delivery on track. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Cloud Backup, Data Failover, Disaster Recovery Tagged With: Data Failover, network, payroll

Mobile disaster recovery trucks – are they a good idea?

March 20, 2013 by tperot Leave a Comment

Service trucks have never been as en vogue as they are today. Nearly everyone is familiar with the mobile trade shows and health care stations, and more recently become adept at Twitter stalking the locations of the ubiquitous food trucks doting the urban landscape. These mobile units are bringing delicious meals to offices and public spaces. Now we’re seeing an uprising in apparel trucks and mobile boutiques. But there’s a more serious side to some of these mobile service providers. They’re also equipped and rolling at the ready as disaster recovery command centers.

IBM and Cisco Systems, Sunguard and others, have implemented mobile disaster recovery services that bundle electrical generators, phones, satellite and wireless connections, Windows servers, and software into portable offices that can be transported by foot or truck into a disaster area.

[Read more...]

Filed Under: Disaster Recovery Tagged With: Disaster Recovery Planning, trucks

Global Data Vault named to LSU 100

March 15, 2013 by willb Leave a Comment

All of us at Global Data Vault are delighted and grateful on learning of our inclusion in the LSU 100 class of 2013. This is our third consecutive year to earn a spot on this prestigious list. As CEO, the LSU connection is mine, but the proper credit belongs to many.

Our team shows up for work and brings creativity, determination and great talent every day. Our customers across the globe have held great faith in our vision. And our partners and suppliers add their effort and wisdom to improve the value we are able to deliver, every day.

It is well worn in the business press that entrepreneurs must be creative, persistent, flexible, and visionary. But actually, in any successful enterprise, you will find these qualities in not only the leadership but in every stakeholder. Global Data Vault is blessed with such a team. And as we look forward to the challenges ahead, we will remain grateful for this generous recognition.

Geaux Tigers!

Filed Under: General Tagged With: awards, LSU, LSU 100

Strategies to prevent DDoS attacks

March 6, 2013 by tperot Leave a Comment

If you think you’re seeing more news about computer hackers, you’re right. It seems this underground community continues to wreck havoc in our online lives and businesses through increasingly sophisticated means of mischief.

While the most publicized hacking events highlight stolen data, that’s not always the motivating factor. Some hackers have mastered the art of DDoS attacks, or Distributed Denial of

Image courtesy of chanpipat/ FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Service attacks. These DDoS attacks have a singular goal of bringing down a website, ecommerce site, or just royally messing up your otherwise good day.

In a typical DDoS attack, the hackers find vulnerability in a targeted computer system, making it the DDoS “master.” The hackers create malware, distributing it from the master to thousands or tens of thousands of other compromised and malicious websites. It’s likely that the website visitors are unaware that they have even downloaded the malware. The malware is programmed with a timed attack function, or it has the ability to be launched by remote control. When the hackers deem it time, all of these miniature terrorist cells get woken up simultaneously by either a timer or a signal, and all are commanded to communicate, sending “packets” of information to or from a website, thereby creating a massive increase of nuisance traffic, and most importantly, blocking legitimate traffic at the same time. The flood of incoming messages to the target system forces it to shut down, a.k.a. “denying service” to legitimate users. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Data Security, Disaster Recovery Tagged With: attacks, ddos, prevent ddos, strategy

Growing amounts of data and what to do about it

February 28, 2013 by tperot Leave a Comment

The biggest challenge facing data centers today is the growing amounts of data that large enterprises create, maintain and store in the cloud. A 2010 Gartner study showed that 47% of respondents ranked data growth in their top three challenges, 62% said they were expanding hardware capacity at existing data centers and 30% planned to build entirely new data center — and that was almost 3 years ago! Imagine the exponential growth of data today as we continue to generate even more massive storage requirements.

As your data expands, moving it from your location to the cloud becomes a parallel problem. Having a faster connection is of paramount concern as your data can literally choke on an inadequate connection. Even having a 100 megabit fiber connection can improve your data protection capabilities significantly, not to mention speed up other business processes. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Cloud Backup, Data Centers, General Tagged With: chattanooga, gigabit, google, smart grid

Do You Need Disaster Recovery for Cloud Services?

February 25, 2013 by tperot Leave a Comment

A fact: More and more companies are putting more and more data in to the cloud. Our appetite for data is growing exponentially and that leads to more dependency on our cloud services providers. However safe they may seem, it’s short sighted to presume that your cloud provider is disaster-proof as well.

The Cloud has become a nearly mainstream way for companies to manage their data and utilize effective data backup and recovery systems. But the cloud is only as good as the data center that it’s housed in, and as we’ve discussed previously, there’s plenty of variation among data center design that can impact the security and efficiency of your cloud backup or hosting continuity. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Cloud Backup Tagged With: chinese, cloud services, Disaster Recovery Planning, enron, hackers, lehman brothers, madoff