Data Replication

Data Replication is the continuous or regular transfer of data to a second storage location in order to improve availability and recoverability. The data is not only backed up but kept available for use in parallel at another location.

A distinction is made between synchronous replication, in which every change only takes effect after confirmation by the second site (no data loss, but dependent on distance and latency), and asynchronous replication, which transfers changes with a time delay and thus allows greater distances – at the price of a possible small window of data loss. Typical fields of application are high availability, site coupling and disaster recovery concepts with demanding restart objectives.

Replication is not a backup substitute, however: faulty, deleted or ransomware-encrypted data is replicated as well – the problem travels with it. Resilient concepts therefore combine replication with independent backups and protected recovery paths, as described by Cyber Recovery.