The Pillars of a Successful Cyber Recovery Solution

Hackers have upped the ante. Throughout 2021, cyber criminals grew more sophisticated, more organized, and more aggressive, using advanced techniques and cooperation among hacker groups to drive an unprecedented number of attacks. All told, the cost may tally an estimated $6 trillion in losses just this year, according to Cyber Security Ventures.

“We have seen many high-profile attacks on organizations and firms across the country in 2021,” says Hassan Kassih, senior director of the National Data Center Practice at ConvergeOne. It took just six ransomware groups to breach 290 organizations, claiming $45 million from the attacks. There was the hit on the Colonial Pipeline, the Steamship Authority of Massachusetts, JBS Food, and the Washington DC Metropolitan Police Department. The shut down of critical infrastructure can create shortages, drive up the costs of goods and services, and deliver significant financial losses.

Despite deep investments in cybersecurity tools, nearly 80% of senior IT and IT security leaders say their organizations lack sufficient protection against cyberattacks, according to an IDG Research Services survey commissioned by Insight Enterprises.

So how do government agencies and companies protect their data? They roll out a sophisticated Cyber Recovery Solution with a data protection architecture that combines multiple layers of protection and security of critical data, whether it’s customer information, trade secrets, social security numbers, or health data.

ConvergeOne’s Kassih outlined the 4 pillars of a Cyber Recovery Solution:

1. Isolation

Kassih compares the need to isolate and secure critical data in a network to the benefit of owning a vault or a safe inside your house.

“You may have a front door that's locked, but anybody can break the glass and get in,” he says. “But the safe is locked, bolted to the ground. It's highly secure. And you store all your valuables like your documents and your passports there. It’s the exact same concept in a cyber recovery vault solution.”

The cyber recovery vault is disconnected and secured from the production network by using a virtual air gapped technology. The vault stores all critical data off-network to isolate it from attack, and it’s restricted from users other than those with proper clearance.

2. Immutability

In recent years, hackers have perfected the ability to get into a network, gain admin access, and ensure they have full access to all systems and devices before launching their massive attack and locking everything. Before they do this, they work hard to locate the backup solution and either delete or encrypt all backup data, so an organization cannot recover—and wind up at the mercy of the attackers.

That’s why it’s so important to have immutable data copies with locked retention policies of all critical data. Kassih said this way, attackers will not be able to delete, encrypt, or manipulate backup data.

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Four Core Components to a Successful Cyber Recovery Solution