Ninety three per cent of UK companies experienced unplanned
downtime in the past year, according to a global survey of 850 IT
managers by research consultancy Dynamic Markets.
Unplanned downtime in the UK ran at the same level as the US and
greater than the survey average of 80%, according to the report,
commissioned by storage software firm Veritas.
Some 14% of companies surveyed suffered more than eight hours of
unplanned downtime in the past year. Only 17% suffered less than
one hour's unplanned downtime.
IT managers also reported that, although many organisations had
disaster recovery plans, 24% did not test their processes.
The main obstacles to testing disaster recovery plans were time and
budgetary constraints, and potential disruption to employees, the
survey found.
In the UK, 100 IT managers took part in the study, which revealed
that hardware failure was the most commonly perceived threat,
closely followed by software failure and viruses.
The study highlighted the risks many organisations were taking with
the development of mobile working. The research revealed that 86%
of organisations were not protecting their mobile data.
Furthermore, the study suggested, too much company data is excluded
from disaster recovery planning. Some analysts estimate that as
much as 60% of corporate data resides on PCs and laptops, but the
survey found that 80% of firms were not protecting their desktop
environments as part of their disaster recovery planning.
However, even those organisations with disaster recovery plans in
place still feared the impact of serious disruption in the event of
a crisis.