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Accounting Repository Availability and Continuity Plan

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Back to main page: Services Availability Continuity Plans

Introduction

This page reports on the Availability and Continuity Plan for the Accounting Repository and it is the result of the risks assessment conducted for this service: a series of risks and treats has been identified and analysed, along with the correspondent countermeasures currently in place. Whenever a countermeasure is not considered satisfactory for either avoiding or reducing the likelihood of the occurrence of a risk, or its impact, it is agreed with the service provider a new treatment for improving the availability and continuity of the service. The process is concluded with an availability and continuity test.

Last Next
Risks assessment 2018-07-06 2019 July
Av/Co plan and test - -


(previous plans are collected here: https://documents.egi.eu/document/3494)

Hardware HA Configuration

(to update)

The Accounting Repository runs on a dedicated physical machine running in the STFC RAL Data Centre. It is powered via the generator-backed UPS.

  • Database and file system are backed up every 24 hours to tape storage. Database binary logs are kept for 14 Days and are included in the tape backup.
  • Server hardware is covered by Dell “ProSupport Plus” with 4Hour mission critical support that ensures that service can be restored in minimum time.
  • In a disaster recovery situation, the latest database backup out the full backups can be recovered from tape and then the binlogs can be applied to do “Point in Time Recovery” of the database. Additionally up to three days worth of accounting messages can be cached on the EGI message brokers which can then be retrieved once service is restored.

Availability requirements and performances

In the OLA it was agreed the following performances targets, on a monthly basis:

  • Availability: 99%
  • Reliability 99%
 Other availability requirements:
- the service accepts messages from authenticated clients
- the service provides data to the Accounting Portal

The service availability is regularly tested by nagios probe org.activemq.OpenWireSSL: https://argo-mon.egi.eu/nagios/cgi-bin/status.cgi?servicegroup=SERVICE_egi.APELRepository&style=overview

The performances reports in terms of Availability and Reliability are produced by ARGO on an almost real time basis and they are also periodically collected into the Documentation Database.

Over the past years, the Accounting Portal hadn't particular Av/Co issues highlighted by the performances that need to be further investigated.

Risks assessment and management

(to review)

For more details, please look at the google spreadsheet. We will report here a summary of the assessment.

Risks analysis

Risk id Risk description Affected components Established measures Risk level Expected duration of downtime / time for recovery Comment
1 Service unavailable / loss of data due to hardware failure All Database and filesystem are backed up every 24 hours to tape storage. Database binary logs are kept for 14 Days and are included in the tape backup.

Server hardware is covered by Dell “ProSupport Plus” with 4Hour mission critical support that ensures that service can be restored in minimum time. In a disaster recovery situation, the latest database backup out the full backups can be recovered from tape and then the binlogs can be applied to do “Point in Time Recovery” of the database.

Low up to 8 hours (1 working day) the measures already in place are considered satisfactory and risk level is acceptable
2 Service unavailable / loss of data due to software failure Any Various types of monitoring in place. Low up to 4 hours (half working day) the measures already in place are considered satisfactory and risk level is acceptable
3 service unavailable / loss of data due to human error Any Backups available. Administrator documentation. Training. Low up to 8 hours (1 working day) the measures already in place are considered satisfactory and risk level is acceptable
4 service unavailable for network failure (Network outage with causes external of the site) APEL-SSM receiver and sender Up to three days worth of accounting messages can be cached on the EGI message brokers which can then be retrieved once service is restored. Low up to 4 hours (half working day) the measures already in place are considered satisfactory and risk level is acceptable
5 Unavailability of key technical and support staff (holidays period, sickness, ...) Any As well as having two staff in the APEL team, administration of the service can also be covered by GOCDB staff and, to a limited extent, other staff within the department. Low 1 or more working days the measures already in place are considered satisfactory and risk level is acceptable
6 Major disruption in the data centre. Fire, flood or electric failure for example All Fire suppression systems and generator backed UPS Low 1 or more working days the measures already in place are considered satisfactory and risk level is acceptable
7 Major security incident. The system is compromised by external attackers and needs to be reinstalled and restored. Daily backup are executed. Backup is stored in a separate system and can be restored in another system Low up to 8 hours (1 working day) the measures already in place are considered satisfactory and risk level is acceptable
8 (D)DOS attack. The service is unavailable because of a coordinated DDOS. APEL-SSM receiver Authentication and authorisation required to send messages via the brokers and messages are additionally checked when received at the Repository Low up to 8 hours (1 working day) the measures already in place are considered satisfactory and risk level is acceptable

Outcome

The level of all the identified risks is acceptable and the countermeasures already adopted are considered satisfactory

Additional information

procedures for the several countermeasures to invoke in case of risk occurrence (put a link if public): risks 1-2-3-7 (backup restoring), risk 5 (general documentation and procedures)

- the Availability targets don't change in case the plan is invoked.

- recovery requirements:
-- Maximum tolerable period of disruption (MTPoD) (the maximum amount of time that a service can be unavailable or undelivered after an event that causes disruption to operations, before its stakeholders perceive unacceptable consequences): 1 week?
-- Recovery time objective (RTO) (the acceptable amount of time to restore the service in order to avoid unacceptable consequences associated with a break in continuity (this has to be less than MTPoD)): 5 days?
-- Recovery point objective (RPO) (the acceptable latency of data that will not be recovered): n.a. (data can be republished)

- approach for the return to normal working conditions as reported in the risk assessment.

Availability and Continuity test

It is not necessary performing the test: the service is low-critical given the HA configuration, and thanks to the fact that the accounting records can be cached up to 3 days in the messaging system, the sites can republish the accounting data, or in case they can also stop in sending them.

Revision History

Version Authors Date Comments

Alessandro Paolini 2018-07-06 first draft, discussing with the provider

Alessandro Paolini 2019-08-20 starting the yearly review...