For any business, the ability to effectively protect data, applications, and the business operations they support is as important as having a reliable accounting system -- the business can’t function without them. The fact is that a devastating cyberattack could be the end of the organization. Besides wreaking havoc on digital infrastructure and business operations, successful cyberattacks can result in fines, restrictions, and loss of customer confidence.
To mitigate the threat, IT and security teams must think holistically about the problem, integrating three elements to form an effective plan: protecting the system from cyberthreats, protecting data and applications, and -- should a successful attack occur -- recovering data and applications to restart business operations as quickly as possible.
Recovery can be difficult. One complication is that it may not be easy to ascertain what resources have been corrupted or compromised. Another is that many elements of the IT estate and an enterprise’s data and apps are spread out over both cloud and on-premises environments, any of which can be impacted. In addition, many attacks have a residual element, with malware installed but hidden and compromising the recovery system without IT’s awareness. And perhaps most challenging of all, siloed and environment-specific legacy solutions need individual attention and remediation. Without a comprehensive and holistic approach, the impact of a breach will drag on for weeks.
Protection hinges on modernization
Modernizing is the key to recovery. Protecting against attacks and responding to attacks requires functionality absent from legacy solutions. New attack vectors arise, especially with the spread of hybrid infrastructure, and that demands more innovative and modern data protection tools and schemes. IT organizations must:
- Protect against cyberattacks: Attackers are ever more sophisticated, and their targets are evolving in ways that can be less secure than older environments. Enterprises have more edge devices that need protection, they have less time to make risk assessments, their infrastructure is highly dynamic, and new vulnerabilities arrive daily. New data protection approaches must consider all of these factors to minimize the potential for losing data in a cyberattack. This demands a comprehensive approach that continuously protects assets across hybrid infrastructure.
- Protect data and applications as they continue to grow: One of the most difficult aspects of providing the necessary level of protection from cyberattacks is to support application and data growth while improving security. This requires purpose-built solutions that have the breadth and comprehensive capabilities necessary to continually include new cloud instances and data storage locations, while also managing them to protect critical resources. IT teams must support growth while protecting a larger IT estate.
- Prepare for speedy recovery: Keeping the business running after an attack requires more than just data and application protection. Business operations have to resume as quickly as possible, with little-to-no data loss or corruption. Every minute an organization is offline is hugely expensive. Cloud-native backup and recovery systems show the greatest promise in meeting these new demands, and they continue to evolve to adapt to the changing threat landscape.
Chart a course for improved protection
A modern data protection solution can ensure that backups are encrypted and protected so that the recovery process can proceed without delay. The chosen platform must provide comprehensive and cohesive protection. Using several different point products will almost certainly result in gaps in protection, and trying to stitch together multiple tools in the heat of a cyberattack can lead to disaster. Stopping lateral spread of malware after a successful incursion reduces the scope of the attack and limits impact.
HPE is a proven partner that can help organizations guard against the latest threats and recover rapidly. A combination of leading-edge technology products and professional services deliver what a business demands.
Another important consideration is operational simplicity. Deploying and operating the platform can’t be a stress point for IT teams. Complex systems often result in operational errors that can leave security gaps or unprotected data. HPE integrated data protection solutions -- as opposed to fragmented solutions pieced together from various vendors -- are simple to manage and can be auto-configured to protect workloads in private, public, or hybrid clouds. Integrated backup and recovery operations are available as a service, reinforcing and enhancing, rather than replacing, an organization’s current data security. Early-warning systems and encrypted backups offer strong protection against cyberattacks and allow organizations to resume operations quickly, at scale, across hybrid and multi-cloud deployments.
