Backup and Disaster Recovery Center (BDRC) provides the data protection scoring feature for Elastic Compute Service resources within your Alibaba Cloud account. This feature helps you understand the overall status of the data protection of your cloud resources. This topic describes the check items that BDRC uses to score the data protection status of Elastic Compute Service resources and provides fix methods. You can better protect and manage the data of Elastic Compute Service resources based on the check items and fix methods.
Check items
Check item | Content | Result | Description |
Disk snapshot | Checks whether the automatic snapshot policy feature is enabled for a disk or whether the ECS instance backup feature of Cloud Backup is enabled. |
| The Alibaba Cloud snapshot service is an agentless data backup service. This service can create crash-consistent snapshots for all types of disks to back up or restore a disk. Crash-consistent snapshots are an effective solution to disaster recovery and can be used to back up data, create images, and implement disaster recovery for applications. |
Cross-region snapshot replication | Checks whether the cross-region snapshot replication feature of automatic disk snapshot policies or the cross-region replication feature for ECS instance backup of Cloud Backup is enabled. |
| By replicating snapshots, you can quickly start your business in a new region or migrate your business systems to a new region. This reduces O&M costs and improves service availability. |
Backup of ECS files and ECS-hosted self-managed databases | Checks whether the ECS file backup or ECS database backup feature of Cloud Backup is enabled. |
| Cloud Backup is a fully-managed online backup service that allows you to back up data to the cloud in a convenient, efficient, and secure manner. You can use the ECS file backup and ECS database backup features of Cloud Backup to protect your application data on ECS instances from multiple dimensions and granularities. The ECS database backup feature supports MySQL, Oracle, SQL Server, and SAP HANA databases. |
Cross-region replication of ECS file backup vaults | Checks whether the cross-region backup feature is enabled for ECS file backup vaults of Cloud Backup. |
| After you use Cloud Backup to protect your ECS files, you can enable the cross-region replication feature for backup vaults to implement remote backup. |
Description of check items and risk fixing methods
Before you enable the following check items, read the descriptions of the check items carefully to learn more about the limits and fees. You can also contact the Alibaba Cloud customer service.
Disk snapshot
Description
Checks whether the automatic snapshot policy feature is enabled for a disk or whether the ECS instance backup feature of Cloud Backup is enabled.
Fix methods
Method 1: Use automatic snapshot policies to protect disks
Log on to the Elastic Compute Service console. In the left-side navigation pane, choose Storage & Snapshots > Snapshots. On the Snapshots page, click the Automatic Snapshot Policies tab. On the Automatic Snapshot Policies tab, click Create Automatic Snapshot Policy to create an automatic snapshot policy. After the policy is created, find the policy and click Associate Cloud Disks in the Actions column to enable the policy.
ImportantBefore you can use the automatic snapshot policy feature, you must activate the snapshot service. After an automatic snapshot policy is enabled, you are charged new fees. For more information, see Create an automatic snapshot policy and Snapshots.
Specific limits are imposed on the use of automatic snapshot policies. For example, the maximum number of automatic snapshots is limited, local disks do not support automatic snapshots, and the disks with which you want to associate an automatic snapshot policy must be in use. For more information, see Overview.
Method 2: Use the ECS instance backup feature of Cloud Backup to protect disks
Log on to the Cloud Backup console. In the left-side navigation pane, choose Backup > ECS Instance Backup. On the ECS Instance Backup page, click Add ECS Backup. In the Add ECS Backup panel, select the ECS instance that you want to protect, create a backup policy, and then configure the backup settings.
ImportantThe ECS instance backup feature of Cloud Backup is developed based on the snapshot service. The ECS instance backup feature provides most capabilities of the snapshot service and is suitable for most scenarios of the snapshot service. This feature allows you to perform operations on ECS instances based on a simple and intuitive UI, which can automatically discover and track all disks of ECS instances and can flexibly restore and clone ECS instances or disks. For more information, see Overview.
Before you can use the ECS instance backup feature of Cloud Backup, you must activate Cloud Backup. If you use the ECS instance backup feature, Cloud Backup charges you the backup software fee based on the number of ECS instances. The snapshot service charges other snapshot-related fees.
For more information about the differences between the two methods, see What are the differences between ECS instance backup and the snapshot service?
Cross-region snapshot replication
Description
Checks whether the cross-region snapshot replication feature of automatic disk snapshot policies or the cross-region replication feature for ECS instance backup of Cloud Backup is enabled.
Fix methods
Method 1: Use automatic snapshot policies to protect disks
Log on to the Elastic Compute Service console. In the left-side navigation pane, choose Storage & Snapshots > Snapshots. On the Snapshots page, click the Automatic Snapshot Policies tab. On the Automatic Snapshot Policies tab, click Create Automatic Snapshot Policy. On the Create Automatic Snapshot Policy page, select Enable for Cross-region Snapshot Replication in the Cross-region Replication section. After the policy is created, find the policy and click Associate Cloud Disks in the Actions column to enable the policy and cross-region snapshot replication.
ImportantBefore you can use the automatic snapshot policy feature, you must activate the snapshot service. After an automatic snapshot policy is enabled, you are charged new fees. For more information, see Create an automatic snapshot policy and Snapshots.
Specific limits are imposed on the use of automatic snapshot policies. For example, the maximum number of automatic snapshots is limited, local disks do not support automatic snapshots, and the disks with which you want to associate an automatic snapshot policy must be in use. For more information, see Overview.
Method 2: Use the ECS instance backup feature of Cloud Backup to protect disks
Log on to the Cloud Backup console. In the left-side navigation pane, choose Backup > ECS Instance Backup. On the ECS Instance Backup page, click Add ECS Backup. In the Add ECS Backup panel, select the ECS instance that you want to protect and create a backup policy. In the policy, enable the cross-region replication feature and configure the backup settings.
ImportantThe ECS instance backup feature of Cloud Backup is developed based on the snapshot service. The ECS instance backup feature provides most capabilities of the snapshot service and is suitable for most scenarios of the snapshot service. This feature allows you to perform operations on ECS instances based on a simple and intuitive UI, which can automatically discover and track all disks of ECS instances and can flexibly restore and clone ECS instances or disks. For more information, see Overview.
Before you can use the ECS instance backup feature of Cloud Backup, you must activate Cloud Backup. If you use the ECS instance backup feature, Cloud Backup charges you the backup software fee based on the number of ECS instances. The snapshot service charges other snapshot-related fees.
Backup of ECS files and ECS-hosted self-managed databases
Description
Checks whether the ECS file backup or ECS database backup feature of Cloud Backup is enabled. The ECS database backup feature supports MySQL, Oracle, SQL Server, and SAP HANA databases.
Fix method
Log on to the Cloud Backup console.
Back up ECS files.
In the left-side navigation pane, choose Backup > ECS File Backup. On the ECS Instances tab of the ECS File Backup page, select an ECS instance and click Back Up in the Actions column. Then, configure the backup settings as prompted.
Back up an ECS-hosted database.
ECS database backup for a MySQL, Oracle, or SQL Server database
In the left-side navigation pane, choose Backup > Database Backup. On the Database Backup page, select a database type and click Register Database Instance. After the registration is complete, find the instance on the ECS Database Instance tab, click Back Up in the Actions column, and then configure the backup settings as prompted.
ECS database backup for a SAP HANA database
In the left-side navigation pane, choose Backup > SAP HANA Backup. On the SAP HANA Backup page, click Register SAP HANA Instance on the SAP HANA Instances tab. After the registration is complete, find the instance on the SAP HANA Instances tab, click Back Up in the Actions column, and then configure the backup settings as prompted.
Before you can use Cloud Backup, you must activate Cloud Backup. If you use the ECS file backup feature, Cloud Backup charges you the file backup software fee and storage usage fee. If you use the ECS database backup feature that supports MySQL, Oracle, SQL Server, and SAP HANA databases, Cloud Backup charges you the SAP HANA backup software fee and storage usage fee. For more information about the billing, see Billing methods and billable items.
For more information, see Back up files from an ECS instance, Overview (ECS-hosted databases), and Back up an SAP HANA database.
Cross-region replication of ECS file backup vaults
Description
Checks whether the cross-region backup feature is enabled for ECS file backup vaults of Cloud Backup.
Fix method
Log on to the Cloud Backup console. In the left-side navigation pane, click Storage Vaults. On the Storage Vaults page, find the backup vault and click Cross-Region Backup in the Actions column. In the Create Mirror Vault panel, select the region to which data is to be backed up from the Region drop-down list and configure other parameters to complete the cross-region backup configuration.
Before you can use the cross-region backup feature of Cloud Backup, you must activate Cloud Backup. You are charged for the traffic generated when you replicate backup data from the backup vault to the mirror vault. For more information, see Billing methods and billable items.
The cross-region backup feature does not support archive vaults, backup vaults for which Key Management Service (KMS)-based encryption is enabled, or database backup vaults. For more information, see Cross-region backup.