Profile Applicability:
 Level 1

Description:
 Implementing a robust backup and disaster recovery (DR) plan ensures that the Aurora database can be restored to a previous state in case of data loss, corruption, or other catastrophic failures. It involves automating backups, storing them in different locations, and setting up recovery procedures to ensure minimal downtime during disasters.

Rationale:
 Backup and disaster recovery are essential components of any data protection strategy. Without a proper backup and recovery plan, an organization risks losing critical data in the event of hardware failure, accidental deletion, or malicious attacks. Implementing an automated and efficient backup process with clear recovery procedures minimizes the impact of such events and ensures business continuity.

Impact:
 Without a proper backup and disaster recovery strategy, an organization may face prolonged downtime, data loss, and business disruption. A robust backup and recovery plan ensures quick recovery and protection against data corruption or deletion.

Default Value:
 By default, Amazon Aurora enables automated backups, but disaster recovery planning (such as multi-region replication, cross-region backups, and backup retention periods) must be manually configured.

Pre-requisites:

  • An AWS account with administrative privileges.

  • Aurora database instance created and configured.

  • A defined recovery point objective (RPO) and recovery time objective (RTO).

  • Access to AWS services like RDS, S3, and CloudFormation to configure backup and recovery settings.

Test Plan:

Using AWS Console:

  1. Navigate to RDS > Databases and select the Aurora instance.

  2. Verify that Automated Backups are enabled and check the backup retention period (default is 7 days).

  3. Review the Snapshot configuration to ensure that backups are being created periodically.

  4. Check if Cross-Region Replication or Read Replicas are configured for disaster recovery.

  5. Ensure that RDS is integrated with S3 for off-site storage of backups.

Using AWS CLI:

  1. Run the following command to check if automated backups are enabled:
     

    aws rds describe-db-instances --query "DBInstances[].{DBInstanceIdentifier:DBInstanceIdentifier, BackupRetentionPeriod:BackupRetentionPeriod}"


  2. Verify that manual snapshots are being created:

     aws rds describe-db-snapshots --db-instance-identifier <db-instance-id>


  3. Check if Cross-Region Replication is set up for the Aurora instance:
     

    aws rds describe-db-instances --query "DBInstances[].{DBInstanceIdentifier:DBInstanceIdentifier, DBClusterIdentifier:DBClusterIdentifier}"


  4. Confirm that S3 backups are configured:
     

    aws rds describe-db-instances --query "DBInstances[].{DBInstanceIdentifier:DBInstanceIdentifier, S3ExportRole:ExportRole}"


Implementation Plan

Using AWS Console:

  1. Navigate to RDS > Databases, select the Aurora instance, and click Modify.

  2. Enable Automated Backups and configure the Backup Retention Period (e.g., 7, 30, or 90 days).

  3. Configure Cross-Region Replication if necessary for disaster recovery, ensuring that data is replicated in a different AWS region.

  4. Set up S3 Integration for storing backups offsite to enhance disaster recovery.

  5. Enable Read Replicas in different regions if geographical redundancy is required.

  6. Review and apply the changes to ensure that backups are taken as per the configured schedule and that the disaster recovery plan is in place.

Using AWS CLI:

  1. Enable Automated Backups with a retention period:

     aws rds modify-db-instance --db-instance-identifier <db-instance-id> --backup-retention-period <retention-period> --apply-immediately


  2. Configure Cross-Region Replication for disaster recovery:

     aws rds create-db-cluster --db-cluster-identifier <db-cluster-id> --source-db-cluster-identifier <source-db-cluster-id> --region <destination-region>


  3. Create a manual snapshot of the Aurora instance:

     aws rds create-db-snapshot --db-instance-identifier <db-instance-id> --db-snapshot-identifier <snapshot-id>


  4. Integrate S3 for backups:

     aws rds export-task --db-instance-identifier <db-instance-id> --s3-bucket-name <bucket-name> --export-task-identifier <export-id>


Backout Plan

Using AWS Console:

  1. In the RDS Dashboard, go to the Modify section and disable Automated Backups.

  2. Remove Cross-Region Replication and Read Replicas if they were enabled.

  3. Disable the integration with S3 for off-site backup storage.

  4. Apply the changes to revert the backup and disaster recovery configuration.

Using AWS CLI:

  1. Disable Automated Backups:

     aws rds modify-db-instance --db-instance-identifier <db-instance-id> --backup-retention-period 0 --apply-immediately


  2. Delete Cross-Region Replication:

     aws rds delete-db-cluster --db-cluster-identifier <db-cluster-id>


  3. Remove S3 Integration for backup export:

     aws rds delete-export-task --export-task-identifier <export-id>


  4. Revert Read Replicas:

     aws rds delete-db-instance --db-instance-identifier <db-instance-id>


References: