Microsoft is extending Azure Site Recovery service to 15 days. That way an IT team can always fall back on uninfected, older data if they face a cyberattack.
Azure Site Recovery is a DRaaS (Disaster Recovery as a Service). The service intervenes as soon as an IT failure occurs within the connected enterprise. Microsoft now announces innovations to the service, “With the rollout of support for longer recovery point retention, you can now retain recovery points for up to 15 days instead of 72 hours.”
Possible to always fall back on something
According to Microsoft, the expansion adds to the utility of the service. For example, malware can go undetected in IT systems for several days. As a result, it may happen that the 72-hour period is over before anyone notices that systems were infected.
An extension to 15 days avoids that problem. Once the infection is noticed, the IT team can fall back on longer saved recovery points. Depending on how far back in time the IT team needs to go, more or fewer recovery points are available.
Over a 24-hour period, Azure Site Recovery stores one recovery point per hour. Only the just past two hours has one recovery point for every five elapsed minutes. Those looking back between 48 hours and seven days will find one recovery point every two hours. Even further back is one recovery point every four hours.
Cost
The service is free for the first 31 days. After that, Microsoft charges based on usage. Saving more restore points also comes with an additional cost.