Data is considered one of the most valuable assets for all businesses today. For this reason, it is of great importance to take precautions to avoid data loss and to be able to continuously access data. When business continuity is mentioned, the thought of being able to access data at all times, under all conditions and from anywhere comes to mind.
In today's competitive environments, businesses are racing against time to provide services, and even very short system outages are not acceptable. When discussing topics that ensure continuity in data centers, it can be identified as the ability to back up data and physically back up data centers, or in other words, establishing a disaster recovery center.
BACKUP OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY EQUIPMENT
Although the main purpose of all infrastructure services such as energy infrastructure, fire extinguishing, security, and climate control is to protect data, the IT equipment that stores and provides access to data must also be protected and backed up. Regarding business continuity, all devices such as servers, network devices, firewalls, and storage units need to be structured in an active-active or active-passive manner. Here, active-active means working redundantly at the same time, and active-passive means that when there is a problem with the primary device, the backup is ready to automatically take over.
BACKUP OF DATA
Backing up data is among the most fundamental measures in data centers. If the backed-up data cannot be retrieved or no backup process has been prepared, businesses may face irreversible losses. At this point in technology, backup processes can be carried out using several different methods and among different resources.
BACKUP TYPES
When deciding on the type of backup to be implemented, the needs must be accurately identified. Generally, there are three types of backup: full, differential, and incremental.
Full Backup
In a full backup, all selected data is backed up as is. This method is the safest backup method because it backs up all data. Therefore, it is also the method that takes the longest time. The full backup method is used when any work is going to be done or when risky situations arise.
Differential Backup
This method does not back up all data like the full backup method. It requires the last full or incremental backup. After the most recent full or incremental backup, only the changes in the data are backed up. As a result of only backing up the changed data, the backup processes are completed in a shorter time compared to full backup. Space savings are achieved in the area where the data will be backed up.
Although it has significant advantages in this respect, the fact that it requires a prior full or incremental backup when restoring data is a disadvantage. If the previously backed up full or incremental data is damaged or if there are issues accessing the data while restoring, the last differential backup cannot be restored either.
Incremental Backup
In the incremental backup method, the data that has changed since the last operation is backed up. The incremental backup method resembles the differential backup method but has significant differences. The main purpose of this method is to gain space in the area where the data is backed up and to ensure that the backup process takes less time.
Deduplicated Backup
In this method, the data to be backed up is broken into pieces, and if these pieces have not been backed up before, they are backed up as they are. However, if the pieces have already been separated and the data has been backed up, only the address of the backed-up section is recorded as a reference. This means that the backed-up piece cannot be backed up again, and if necessary, the data is restored from this address. This method is very useful in terms of time and cost savings.
