Like their private industry counterparts, federal, state and local government agencies must be able
to meet the increasing demands for continuous operations in the face of disruptions resulting from
day-to-day glitches, to cyber-threats, to natural disasters or physical attacks. However, government
responsibilities far exceed those of the private sector – agencies must maintain public health and
safety and ensure trade, commerce, transportation, and economic stability at all times.
High Availability and Disaster Recovery for Government Organizations
In the event of a disaster, business continuity plans must protect the availability and integrity
of mission-critical applications and information, reduce decision-making time and increase constituent confidence.
Access to Mission-Critical Applications. Government applications are subject to all
matter of disasters – from state-wide catastrophes to everyday intrusions. Whether an organization
has one or more than one hundred, mission-critical applications must be accessible to employees
and constituents at all times.
Protecting Information Assets. The control and availability of information is a crucial
component in the continuity of government operations. With the exponential growth of records and
information, there is an increasing need to safeguard information assets against natural and man-made disasters.
Ensuring Stability & Preserving Agency Integrity. In order to ensure stability and
protect agency integrity, Federal, State and Local organizations are managed by directives designed
to maintain the delivery of essential functions and services in the event of a disaster.
Maintaining Collections Capabilities. In cases where government organizations are
responsible for collecting taxes or fees, downtime is a costly event. A disaster recovery plan must
be designed to ensure that the agency has an ability to accept constituent payments, even in
the event of a system failure.
Complying with Mandates and Regulations. Agencies must comply with COOP, OMB, DOD or
International mandates and regulations to preserve operations, and in some cases, to maintain
public safety and economic stability.
Administering with Existing IT Staff. With the constant pressures to increase
efficiencies and decrease costs, government organizations do not always have an ideal number of
IT personnel. An agency must be able to easily test and administer the disaster recovery
solutions with the resources at hand.
Seamless Experience for Citizens. In order to maintain citizen confidence,
conversions from a primary to secondary servers hosting business-critical applications
must be seamless to the user.
