Rewriting Disaster Recovery Plans for the Edge

Writing a disaster recovery plan has been the responsibility of IT departments for years, but now these plans must be recalibrated to failover for edge and cloud environments. What's new, and how do organizations revise their plans?

Rule 1: IT does not control the edge

Given the adoption of edge computing and other distributed computing strategies, IT can’t control all of this distributed compute with a standard centralized DR plan that is built around the data center. In day to day manufacturing using robotics and automation, for example, it is line supervisors and manufacturing staff who run the robots and are responsible for making sure that these assets are safe and secure in locked areas when they are not in use. In many cases, these manufacturing personnel might also install and monitor/maintain the equipment themselves, or work with vendors.

These personnel do not have IT’s background in security or asset protection and maintenance/monitoring. At the same time, installing new edge networks and solutions outside of IT multiplies the number of IT assets where failures could occur. Somewhere, DR and failover plans need to be documented and trained for so these assets are covered. The most logical place for this to occur is within the IT DR and business continuity plan.

To revise the plan, IT must meet and work with these different distributed computing groups. The key is getting everyone involved and committed to documenting a DR and failover plan that they then participate in and test on a regular basis.

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