Disaster recovery & business continuity Melbourne
Disaster recovery in Melbourne: immutable Microsoft 365 and server backups, regular restore tests and a continuity plan, so you know how fast you'd be back.
What is disaster recovery and business continuity for a Melbourne business?
Key IT provides backup and disaster recovery for Melbourne businesses: we design, build and regularly test the backups and recovery plans that bring back your servers, files and Microsoft 365 within an agreed time and data-loss limit after a hardware failure, ransomware attack or wiped mailbox. Disaster recovery is that tested ability to restore systems and data; business continuity is keeping the business trading while you recover.
When something does fail, the question is not whether you recover — it is how long it takes and how much data you lose. Our job is to make that answer known and rehearsed before the crisis, rather than discovered in the middle of one.
Quick answers
Do we need a separate Microsoft 365 backup? Yes. Microsoft keeps the service running, but protecting your own mail and files from deletion, ransomware on synced files and compromised accounts is left to you, so Key IT keeps a separate, independent copy of your Exchange, SharePoint, OneDrive and Teams data.
What are RTO and RPO? Recovery Time Objective is how long you can be down; Recovery Point Objective is how much data you can afford to lose. These two numbers drive the design of your recovery solution.
How are backups protected from ransomware? Key IT uses immutable storage, separate authentication and isolated retention, so an attacker who reaches your network cannot delete or encrypt your backups.
Do you test that recovery actually works? Yes — every contracted disaster recovery client gets regular restore testing, with workloads recovered to an isolated environment, verified and documented, and the design reworked if recovery is too slow.
Where does a disaster recovery plan start?
Every disaster recovery plan begins with two numbers: your Recovery Time Objective (how long you can be down) and Recovery Point Objective (how much data you can afford to lose). Everything else flows from these. A system with a four-hour RTO and fifteen-minute RPO needs a very different design from a file server that can tolerate a day — and matching the design to the need is how you avoid both unnecessary cost and nasty surprises. We set both numbers with you by working out what each hour offline costs in idle staff, lost billing and missed orders; our breakdown of what a cyber attack costs an Australian small business shows where that money goes.
What does Key IT back up and protect?
Key IT protects the systems a Melbourne business actually runs on — Microsoft 365, servers and workloads, and the files on laptops and workstations — with immutable, ransomware-resilient backups underneath.
Microsoft 365 backup
Independent backup of Exchange, SharePoint, OneDrive and Teams, because Microsoft does not protect you from deletion, ransomware or compromised accounts.
Server and workload backup
Image-level backup with local recovery for speed and offsite replication for resilience, plus instant virtualisation for critical servers.
Endpoint and file recovery
Protection for data held on laptops and workstations.
Clinical practice software
For medical clinics, Key IT keeps Best Practice's built-in backup running and adds a separate immutable copy on top; for dental practices on Dental4Windows, the practice server is copied to immutable storage as well.
Immutable, ransomware-resilient backups
Designed to survive an attacker who tries to delete them.
Want to see what this looks like for your business? A free IT & Cyber Security Review shows where you stand and what to fix first — no jargon, no obligation.
Book a Free ReviewWhat does a business continuity plan include?
A business continuity plan covers what your business does in the first hour, day and week of an outage, because backup on its own is not a continuity plan. Key IT documents it with you: a business impact analysis that ranks which systems come back first, recovery runbooks stored where you can reach them when your own network is down, a communication plan for staff, clients and suppliers, and manual workarounds that keep work moving. We then review and rehearse it, because a plan nobody has practised tends to fail on the day. If ransomware is the scenario that worries you most, our walk-through of what happens during a ransomware attack shows where each defence fits.
How does Key IT test disaster recovery?
Key IT gives every contracted disaster recovery client regular restore testing: we recover a workload to an isolated environment, verify it, and document the result. If a restore takes longer than your RTO, we redesign. Untested backups are stories, not insurance — and an untested backup is the single most common gap we find when taking over from another provider.
Frequently asked questions
Isn't the Microsoft 365 recycle bin a backup?
No. Recycle bins only hold deleted items for a limited time, and both they and your retention settings sit inside the same tenant a compromised admin account can reach. If data is purged, or the loss is noticed after the bin empties, those copies are gone. Key IT adds an independent backup kept outside that reach.
Is OneDrive a backup?
No. OneDrive is a sync service: it keeps the same files in step across your laptop and the cloud, so a change on one side is copied to the other. That is handy for working anywhere, but it also means that when a file on a synced laptop is deleted, saved over or encrypted by ransomware, the same thing happens to the file in OneDrive. Version history can roll back a single file, but it is no substitute for a backup. Key IT keeps a separate, independent copy of your OneDrive data alongside Exchange, SharePoint and Teams, so files can be restored from a copy the sync never touched.
What is the difference between backup and disaster recovery?
Backup is a copy of your data. Disaster recovery is the tested ability to restore systems and data within defined time and data-loss objectives. Business continuity is keeping the business operating while you recover.
What are RTO and RPO?
Recovery Time Objective is how long you can be down; Recovery Point Objective is how much data you can afford to lose. They drive the design of your recovery solution.
Can ransomware delete our backups?
Not if they are immutable, meaning they cannot be changed until a set retention period ends. Key IT keeps backups that way, with separate sign-in credentials and isolated retention, so even an attacker who gets into your network with an admin password cannot alter, encrypt or delete them.
What is the 3-2-1 backup rule?
Keep three copies of your important data, on two different types of storage, with one copy off-site. That way a dead server, a flood in the comms cupboard or a stolen laptop never takes your only copy. Key IT builds on the rule for ransomware: local backups for fast restores, replication off-site, and an immutable copy behind separate credentials, so even an attacker inside your network cannot wipe them all.
How often do you test recovery?
Regularly for contracted clients — we recover workloads to an isolated environment, verify them, and document the result, redesigning if recovery is too slow.
Does the Essential Eight require backups?
Yes. Regular backups are one of the Australian Cyber Security Centre's Essential Eight strategies: back up data, applications and settings, test restores as part of disaster recovery exercises, and stop ordinary user accounts from changing or deleting backups. Our plain-English Essential Eight guide explains the other seven.
Will our cyber insurer ask about our backups?
Expect it to. Renewal questionnaires now commonly ask whether backups are offline or immutable, kept behind separate credentials, and when a restore was last tested. Key IT documents each restore test for contracted clients, so you can answer with evidence, not guesswork. Our cyber insurance renewal checklist covers the other controls insurers check.
Can you help us recover from a ransomware attack now?
Yes. Phone 1300 053 948 for incident response: Key IT contains the attack, then restores from clean backups that survived. If those backups were kept out of the attacker's reach, you can trade again without paying a ransom. Data copied out before encryption still needs a breach assessment, because a restore cannot undo a leak.
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