The presence of the website on the Internet is to deliver information and services on a 24X7 basis. Hence, all efforts shall be made to minimize the downtime of the website as far as possible.
It is therefore necessary that a proper Contingency Plan to be prepared to handle any eventualities and restore the site in the shortest possible time. The possible contingencies include:
- Defacement of the website: All possible security measures must be taken for the website to prevent any possible defacement/hacking by unscrupulous elements. However, if despite the security measures in place, such an eventuality occurs, there must be a proper contingency plan, which should immediately come into force. If it has been established beyond doubt that the website has been defaced, the site must be immediately blocked. The contingency plan must clearly indicate as to who is the person authorized to decide on the further course of action in such eventualities. The complete contact details of this authorized person must be always available with the web management team. Efforts should be made to restore the original site in the shortest possible time. At the same time, regular security reviews and checks should be conducted in order to plug any loopholes in the security.
- Data Corruption:A proper mechanism must be worked out by the concerned in consultation with their web hosting service provider to ensure that appropriate and regular back-ups of the website data are being taken. These enable a fast recovery and uninterrupted availability of the information to the citizens in view of any data corruption.
- Hardware/Software Crash:Though such an occurrence is rare, still in case the server on which the website is being hosted crashes due to some unforeseen reason, the web hosting service provider must have enough redundant infrastructure available to restore the website at the earliest.
- Natural Disasters:There could be circumstances whereby due to some natural calamity, the entire data center where the website is being hosted gets destroyed or ceases to exist. A planned contingency mechanism has to be in place for such eventualities whereby it should be ensured that the Hosting Service Provider has a ‘Disaster Recover Centre (DRC)’ set up at a geographically remote location and the website is switched over to the DRC with minimum delay and the access through internet is restored.