Backup Internet Options For Law Offices

It's a good practice to keep an internet outage plan for your office.

Disclaimer: If you're looking to upgrade your backup internet, or are just trying to learn the right terms to tell your IT Provider, these are just a few ideas to consider as a solo-practice to medium size firm. Remember, use this list as a starting point for your internet recovery plan during critical events, it's not meant to be exhaustive or an endorsement, this is just my experience. With that out of the way, let's dive in!

Terminology to use with your IT professional

Most IT professionals will call backup internet a 'Backup WAN.' This might resonate if you're familiar with 'LAN,' denoting a Local Area Network (local: think your office, or your floor, or your division). A WAN is a Wide Area Network (usually the wider internet, but in big systems could be hops between big data centers). So when 'Backup WAN' is used, you can safely interpret it as 'Backup Internet' for the rest of the article.

Evaluating backup internet options for a solo-practice to medium size law firm

• Security Requirements
• Duration of Outage
• Bandwidth and Latency
• Connected Users

Bottom line up front: Most 'outages' are temporary (hours) in nature due to fiber cuts or network equipment issues and can be handled with your personal hotspot if it is just you and a trusted guest. For anything substantially longer than that, i.e. natural disasters, or with many users of varying permission levels, the cellular or satellite router are your best options.

Mobile Hotspot: For when you're in a pinch

This is a surefire way to save your tail in a jam. If you have 5-10 years experience with mobile phones, you should be able to figure it out easily from your phone's settings. Any plan add-ons will be explained there, too. Biggest thing to remember, keep a phone charger around. Using your phone's hotspot will deplete your battery quickly and if you don't have the juice what started out as a great save could sour quickly. Also, again, if any guests connect to your phone it is a direct connection to your device, and though many smart phones have software firewalls - it's just not best practice to open any connection to untrusted parties.

Average Cost: included in plan or ~$10/month + $5-10/Gb used

Next steps to activate Cellular Hotspot

Cellular Router: Office protection

This is where IT experience comes into play. Cellular Routers are usually intended to connect as a dedicated WAN service to your office's LAN. There are firewall and routing rules for how to handle the 'failover' of the primary internet connection to the backup that are pretty involved for even those with experience. Consider hiring an IT contractor to set this up. Once installed, it is fairly robust and shouldn't require an inordinate amount of support.

Average Cost: ~$60+/month

Next steps to implement Cellular Backup Internet

Satellite Router: Disaster recovery or remote projects

Same note about IT experience as above with Cellular Routers. Consider hiring an IT contractor to set this up. Satellite Routers are unique in that they are not local ground networks. Meaning that connections are robust no matter how remote or how bad the situation is in your area, or even your state. This is a good last line of defense or premium option for guarantee internet. What's more: some projects may require mobile command stations in remote areas. These are perfect for something like Starlink as their primary internet connection.

Base Cost: $599 Hardware + $140/month

Next steps to implement Satellite Backup Internet