In 2013, cyber attacks were cited as a cause for U.S. data center downtime by 34 percent of survey respondents, compared to just 15 percent in 2010, according to a recent Ponemon Institute study that was sponsored by Emerson Network Power. The study results would underscore the importance for companies to prioritize risk mitigation.
The Ponemon ‘2013 Study on Data Center Outages’ is a survey of 584 individuals in U.S. organizations who have responsibility for data center operations. The report also analyzes costs and a number of other downtime-related factors at 67 data centers (2,500 sq ft or more) within the past year across varying industry segments.
In addition to the ‘2013 Study on Data Center Outages’, a companion report was released by Emerson and Ponemon highlighting the cost of data center outages. That report quantifies the cost of an unplanned data center outage at slightly more than $7,900 per minute, a 41 percent increase from 2010.
“On the heels of Cyber Monday, data center downtime is an e-commerce platform manager’s biggest concern,” said Scott Barbour, global business leader of Emerson Network Power. “There is a need for additional investment in data center infrastructure management in order to support increasingly mobile, social and cloud-based businesses. The data in these reports will help decision-makers evaluate financial implications associated with mitigating risk.”
Highlights of the ‘2013 Study on Data Center Outages’ report and the companion ‘2013 Cost of Data Center Outages’ include:
- The average reported outage length was 86 minutes, resulting in an average cost per incident of approximately $690,200, whereas in 2010 the average outage was 97 minutes and cost approximately $505,500.
- For a total data center outage, which had an average recovery time of 119 minutes, average costs were approximately $901,500, whereas in 2010 the average recovery time was 134 minutes and cost about $680,700.
- For a partial data center outage, which averaged 56 minutes in length, average costs were approximately $350,400, whereas in 2010 a partial outage averaged 59 minutes and cost approximately $258,000.
- Companies with revenue models that depend on the data center’s ability to deliver IT and networking services to customers – such as telecommunications service providers and e-commerce companies; and those that deal with a large amount of secure data, such as defense contractors and financial institutions – continue to incur the most significant downtime costs; with the highest cost of a single event reaching more than $1.7 million.
Emerson Network Power, a subsidiary of Emerson (NYSE: EMR), delivers software, hardware and services that maximize availability, capacity and efficiency for data centers, healthcare and industrial facilities.
