Confirming the worst fears of many Australians, the Bureau of Meteorology has declared that a third La Niña event is underway in the Pacific, increasing the chances of above-average rainfall throughout Spring and Summer in eastern Australia.

According to the advisory from the BOM on 13 September, “Key atmospheric and oceanic indicators of the El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) show an established La Niña. Tropical Pacific sea surface temperatures have been cooling since June and are now at La Niña thresholds. Atmospheric indicators including the Southern Oscillation Index (SOI), trade wind strength, and equatorial cloudiness are also displaying patterns typical of a La Niña event.

Models indicate this La Niña event may peak during the spring and return to neutral conditions early in 2023. La Niña events increase the chances of above-average rainfall for northern and eastern Australia during spring and summer.”

Translated into plain English, we’re in for more rain and floods across the east of the country.

And for anyone that still has doubts about the persistence of these changing weather patterns, the BOM conclude the advisory by saying “Climate change continues to influence Australian and global climate. Australia's climate has warmed by around 1.47 °C for the 1910–2020 period. Southern Australia has seen a reduction of 10–20% in cool season (April–October) rainfall in recent decades. There has also been a trend towards a greater proportion of rainfall from high intensity short duration rainfall events, especially across northern Australia.”

Understanding exactly what it all means is hard, but if recent experience is anything to go by, it’s not good. On top of the devastating floods in recent years, and prior to the oft touted ‘unprecedented pandemic’, who could forget the devastating fires of the 2019/20 Summer?

According to the WWF, it was “the most catastrophic bushfire season ever experienced in the country’s history. So much was lost, and the impacts will be felt for years to come. Up to 19 million hectares were burnt, with 12.6 million hectares primarily forest and bushland. 33 lives were lost and around 3,094 homes destroyed.”

That’s aside from other natural disasters, like cyclones, that we experience in different parts of the country every year, and more localised flooding, fires, droughts and similar impacts on businesses and the community.

And of course, we’re experiencing these impacts in other parts of the globe as well, most recently with wildfires and heatwaves across the northern hemisphere.

The Center for Climate and Energy Solutions (C2ES), a world leading environmental policy think tank in Pennsylvania, says “One of the most visible consequences of a warming world is an increase in the intensity and frequency of extreme weather events. Their National Climate Assessment finds that the number of heat waves, heavy downpours, and major hurricanes has increased in the United States, and the strength of these events has increased, too.

A measure of the economic impact of extreme weather is the increasing number of billion-dollar disasters resulting from all types of weather disasters, some of which are known to be influenced by climate change (floods, tropical storms) and some for which a climate influence is uncertain (tornadoes).”

C2ES states that “Climate change is expected to worsen the frequency, intensity, and impacts of some types of extreme weather events. For example, sea level rise increases the impacts of coastal storms and warming can place more stress on water supplies during droughts.”

From 2000-2021, the top ten costliest disasters impacting the U.S. are:

• Hurricane Katrina (August 2005) - US$182.5B, 1,833 fatalities
• Hurricane Harvey (August 2017) - US$141.3B, 89 fatalities
• Hurricane Maria (September 2017) - US$101.7B, 2,981 fatalities
• Hurricane Sandy (October 2012) - US$80B, 159 fatalities
• Hurricane Ida (August 2021) - US$75B, 96 fatalities
• Hurricane Irma (September 2017) - US$56.5B, 97 fatalities
• Hurricane Ike (September 2008) - US$39.6B, 112 fatalities
• S. Drought/ Heatwave (2012) - US$36.9B, 123 fatalities
• Hurricane Ivan (September 2004) - US$30.8B, 57 fatalities
• Hurricane Wilma (October 2005) - US$27.7B, 35 fatalities

And billion-dollar drought events are almost an annual occurrence now in the United States:

• 2021 – US$9.9B
• 2020 – US$4.8B
• 2018 – US$3.3B
• 2017 – US$2.8B
• 2016 – US$4.0B
• 2015 – US$5.3B
• 2014 – US$4.7B
• 2013 – US$12.6B
• 2012 – US$36.9B
• 2011 – US$15.1B
• 2009 – US$4.6B
• 2008 – US$9.3B
• 2007 – US$4.8B
• 2006 – US$8.4B
• 2005 - $2.2B
• 2003 – US$7.7B
• 2002 – US$14.1B
• 2000 – US$8.2B

That’s all terrifying, and kind of overwhelming, so what does it mean for you as an individual business owner or manager?

How to Prepare

It means that if you haven’t already done so, you need to prepare for the unexpected. In business you strive for control and predictability. It helps to plan for cash flow, inventory management, staffing and every other variable that you are inevitably juggling in order to survive, and all going well, to thrive.

The NSW Government says “the total economic costs of natural disasters in Australia are estimated to average around $6.3 billion per year (Source: Insurance Council of Australia, 2013).

• Extreme weather and natural disasters will happen and are forecast to increase in frequency and severity
• Knowing the risks that affect your business enables you to better prepare and plan for them
• Businesses that prepare and plan for emergencies:
• Help increase the safety of employees and their families
• Are more likely to reduce damage and associated costs
• Get back on their feet quicker after a disaster”

They’ve created a tool to help you to put in place an Emergency Business Continuity Plan (BCP) for your business: https://www.sesemergencyplan.com.au/business/

The Queensland Government also offers advice on building a Business Continuity Plan (BCP): 

“Your business continuity plan should contain all the information you need to get your business running again after an incident or crisis. This may include operating remotely from your normal place of work.

Your business continuity plan will form part of your business plan.

The size and complexity of your business continuity plan will depend on your business. It will typically include the following sections:

• executive summary, introduction, distribution list, objectives and glossary
• risk management plan with business impact analysis
• incident response plan, with plan activation, incident response team, communications and contact list
• recovery plan
• test, evaluate and update schedule.”

Every business should invest in developing its own Business Continuity Plan, along with a Disaster Recovery Plan, and some businesses choose to combine the two into a BCDR.

Planning for the Worst Scenarios

A BCP (Business Continuity Plan) deals with keeping business operations running — perhaps in another location or by using different tools and processes — after a disaster has struck, whereas a DRP (Disaster Recovery Plan) deals with restoring normal business operations after the disaster takes place.

They are vital to ensure that you’re prepared for the unexpected, and importantly, so that you’re not forced to make difficult and complex decisions under pressure, at a time when you may be literally fighting for survival. It’s not only critical for your business, but the ramifications are much wider impacting your family and personal life, and the livelihoods and well-being of your employees, suppliers, customers, and others in the surrounding community.  

And while so much of our attention is rightly drawn to natural disasters and the pandemic, there are of course so many other ways that a business can be disrupted. Depending on the size and nature of the business, it could be as simple as a car or home break in where a laptop or hard drive is stolen, or a building fire. By definition, accidents are unintended and unforeseen incidents that cause a major upheaval and shock to your normal everyday life and business operations.

We see it every day, with businesses compromised in cyberattacks. If your data or servers are impacted by a ransomware attack for example, it can be an existential threat to your business. The speed and immediacy of day-to-day business communications is something that we take for granted, but when that is disrupted by a cyber incident, or by a shock in the physical world like a natural disaster, everything can quickly grind to a halt.

What happens when you can’t communicate with customers about their orders? When you can’t confirm with a supplier to arrange stock for an upcoming project or other commitments? What if you lose access to your data all together, so you don’t know what payments, payable or receivable, are due when and to/from whom? Access to those seemingly small details that we often take for granted can vanish in the blink of an eye, turning your world upside down.

Our Solutions

A BCP and DRP should help to anticipate and mitigate many of those headaches, but they will still inevitably be painful times. At MailGuard, our expertise is in helping businesses to manage that cyber risk. Firstly, by protecting your inboxes against threats with our advanced email security solutions to stop phishing, BEC and ransomware attacks from reaching employee inboxes, among other nasties. But there are many vectors for an attack, and many ways that a business can be impacted in both the cyber and physical worlds.

Back-ups and archiving are another important step and can help to get you back on your feet. But in the middle, are the minutes, hours, days and sometimes weeks when your customers, suppliers and staff members are waiting for answers, anxious to get back to business.

That’s where an email continuity solution can really come into its own. MailGuard Live offers email continuity and recovery for business, government, and enterprise customers, providing extended email availability to ensure interruptions to your local environment or your cloud infrastructure don’t compromise email access across your organisation.

A fully managed secondary email system, it provides employees with continuous access to their email in the event of a primary email server outage caused by a cyber incident, natural disaster, or similar unforeseen shock. All emails are still filtered via MailGuard’s enterprise-grade email filtering protection against threats like phishing, spear-phishing, malware, and spam, with automatic queuing of all sent and received email for a rolling period. If your server is unavailable, you can activate MailGuard Live, ensuring your queue becomes static, so that no email is deleted. New and recent email is available via a webmail client and securely queued for delivery to your server as soon as it is back online.

And in the meantime, your team will have full email productivity. MailGuard Live goes beyond traditional email continuity, not only guaranteeing email delivery via queuing, but providing full email productivity – including sending, receiving, reading, and composing emails – in a fully functional email environment, with full access to your personal address book. Your employees will have access to the webmail client by an authenticated log-in.

So, while our fingers are crossed for an incident free future, sadly we know that’s just not going to happen. Stuff happens, putting it politely. To make sure you’re in the best position to quickly respond and bounce back, make the necessary plans and adjustments to your operations now. You’ll be glad you did when that day comes.

Speak to a MailGuard expert about the cyber and disaster resilience of your business, by reaching out to expert@mailguard.com.au, or call 1300 304 430.

One email is all that it takes     

All that it takes to devastate your business is a cleverly worded email message that can steal sensitive user credentials or disrupt your business operations. If scammers can trick one person in your company into clicking on a malicious link or attachment, they can gain access to your data or inflict damage on your business.     

For a few dollars per staff member per month, you can protect your business with MailGuard's predictive and advanced email security. Talk to a solution consultant at MailGuard today about securing your company's inboxes.  

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