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September 16, 2004 -- (WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) -- In August of 2003, the blackout hit North America's eastern seaboard, cutting power through an area that included parts of Ontario, Ohio, Connecticut and New York.

To most of the 50 million people it affected, the 2003 blackout was a serious inconvenience. To many businesses it meant lost productivity. And for the Web hosting industry, the blackout was a real-world test of the emergency systems that form one of the biggest areas of concern, and investment, in the business of data center construction and operations.

Beyond any advantages in marketing or hype, Internet data center operators live and die by their preparedness for catastrophic events like the 2003 blackout. And, while these elaborate, costly backup systems are regularly tested with elaborate care, the real event was the real test - a chance to prove the value of the massive investments in infrastructure, along with the possibility of public failure.

Data center operators have designed their facilities to stay up and running, protected from power failure by extensive backup power, cooling systems, network redundancy and diversity. The gap in normal power flow was covered by uninterruptible power supply battery systems to prevent damage to servers, routers and other equipment. During the extended commercial power outage, diesel generators were employed to provide power, using fuel securely stored on site. Many fuel suppliers were also on standby to provide additional service. Because of these precautions, most major peering points, network operations and data centers were accessible during the 2003 blackout.

"Our customers became aware of the blackout when the lights went out in their offices," says Tarif Abboushi, senior director of data center infrastructure at hosting and network service provider Verio. (verio.com) "However, they never became aware of it on the network level because of the continuity of our services."

While some data centers did experience outages, due to faulty HVAC or other system configurations, Verio's operations continued seamlessly. "As soon as the utilities failed, our data centers in affected areas transferred to backup systems. We consulted with our facility engineers to ensure operational coordination, but we did not experience any glitch in the way our systems operated."

Verio says it has seen no need to amend any of its systems. They functioned as intended during the crisis. In fact, the Verio data center in Manhattan functioned so well that The New York Times ran some of its editorial operations within the data center alongside its Web site during the outage.

In the United States, many other hosting companies, including Equinix, Level 3 Communications and NaviSite, also reported that their facilities effected immediate and seamless transitions to backup power systems.

Keynote Systems (keynote.com), an Internet performance management and testing firm, reported that the Internet's major backbones and Web sites did not show any adverse effects from the massive power outage. The company watched all of the major US Internet backbones from the 25 largest US metropolitan areas and did not detect any major difficulties during the outage.

One year after the blackout, the event has not been an impetus for change among Web hosting firms, which for the most part weathered the threat, but may have instead proven to be a selling point for hosting-related services like disaster recovery, as it offered proof of the basic Web hosting premise: Electronic data is at risk, and can only be safe in the facilities of a well-prepared service provider.

"In a study of more than 200 small business owners and IT directors, Imation Corp. found that 55 percent of respondents ranked their businesses as fair, poor or completely without a documented disaster recovery plan," stated Bob Herman, a market development manager for small businesses at data storage hardware firm Imation Corp. (imation.com) "This situation exposed many of them to data loss that could occur as a result of a natural disaster, electrical blackout or email virus. Businesses should therefore develop and regularly test their data backup plans."

While 87 percent of companies did report having some type of formal data backup and storage plan implemented, 32 percent of those companies reported not testing their plans on a regular basis. In addition, 64 percent of the companies surveyed said they did not conduct external audits of their data storage and backup systems on a regular basis.

"It is our recommendation that enterprises review all their various systems, applications and processes and prioritize them," states Craig Hurley, a Verio product manager. "After that identification, companies should determine what type of risk mitigation strategies should be put in place and then design a plan for their implementation."

Verio, like many other Web hosting firms, has dedicated an entire suite of services to helping businesses backup and restore data, and continue with online transaction processing in the wake of catastrophic incidents. The company intends to roll out an affordable, new data backup product in September, specifically for small-to mid-sized businesses.

Ultimately, the 2003 blackout's biggest impact on the hosting business may be that it has given Web hosting providers a more convincing argument for emerging services like disaster recovery.