The Cloud: Only One Part of a Complete Backup Plan
Most businesses believe that moving data to the Cloud eliminates the need for data backups, but unfortunately this is not entirely true. In actuality, as part of their Service Agreement vendors such as Microsoft Office 365 recommend that users regularly back up their content and data in multiple locations.
Migrating data from a local office to a Cloud provider’s data center – such as Microsoft or Amazon – shifts the burden of dealing with hardware and software failures to the provider. It is still the responsibility of the end user to make sure that data stored in the Cloud is not their only copy.
Microsoft Office 365 products offer wonderful built-in data loss prevention features in case data is accidentally deleted. Major use cases of these features include email, SharePoint Online, and OneDrive for business applications. If the administrator has deleted a former employee’s information, the Microsoft retention policy allows for 30 to 90 days to restore that deleted data
However, this built-in data loss functionality and business continuity strategy does not replace an actual backup.
Backup for the Cloud
In its essence, a backup is a full copy of the production data stored in an alternative location which can be made available on demand in whole or in part at a future time.
Regularly backing up Cloud data makes perfect business sense as one out of every three Cloud users reported data loss due to an accidental deletion which was not discovered past the retention period. In addition to accidental deletion, users are also vulnerable to permanent malicious deletion by disgruntled employees and cyberattacks on the local network or the systems that affect data stored in the Cloud.
One of the industry-leading backup and disaster recovery software solutions for virtual, physical, and multi-cloud infrastructure is Veeam. Veeam Backup enables companies to securely backup and protect data from deletion, cybersecurity threats, and retention policy gaps. Furthermore, in only a few clicks it enables them to easily restore Microsoft Office 365 Exchange emails, calendar events, contacts, SharePoint sites, and OneDrive for business files and folders.
Secure Offline Backup Solution
Cloud-based infrastructure with industry-leading backup software (Veeam + Microsoft Office 365) nearly completes the time-honored 3-2-1 backup strategy of three copies of your data (your production data and two backup copies) on two different media (disk and tape) with one copy offsite and offline.
As recommended by the British and US governments for ransomware protection and best cybersecurity guidelines, keeping an up-to-date and tested copy of your data offline is one of the highest priorities. In the event of a cyberattack, wiping critical files and/or systems or encrypting them on an offline copy on hardware-encrypted media are the ultimate defense strategies. The Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency states:
It is critical to maintain offline, encrypted backups of data and to regularly test your backups. Backup procedures should be conducted on a regular basis. It is important that backups be maintained offline as many ransomware variants attempt to find and delete any accessible backups. Maintaining offline, current backups is most critical because there is no need to pay a ransom for data that is readily accessible to your organization.
The Veeam console can easily be configured to save a copy of your data to an external USB drive, thereby eliminating the need to back up jobs manually. This is a crucial part of a secure backup plan to complement your Cloud storage, as SecureData drives are offline hardware-encrypted devices. Without a password or PIN, they cannot be accessed. Their internal components are epoxy-coated to prevent physical tampering and when 10 consecutive incorrect password attempts are made, all data is completely erased.
Hardware Solutions
SecureData has driven innovation in FIPS 140-2 Level 3 hardware-encrypted storage for over a decade. Our award-winning line of SecureDrive® BT and SecureDrive® KP drives offers the highest level of protection against unauthorized access while also safely storing data offline. These drives require user authentication in order to unlock them, and they can be customized to restrict capabilities even to authorized users.
SecureDrive’s BT devices can be combined with the Remote Management Console to provide a complete managed security solution. It allows IT administrators to control who can access the data, when they can do it, and where your data is accessed. BT Drives can be geo- and time-fenced through Remote Management to prevent access outside of certain geographic and time parameters.
SecureDrives® Give You Managed and Unmanaged Control of Your Data
SecureDrive® BT and SecureUSB® BT feature dual authentication via a secure wireless mobile app and Bluetooth connection, as well as a unique drive PIN. In addition to all the features of SecureDrive® KP devices, BT devices have managed control features that give IT administrators total control over where and when devices can be accessed.
In addition to the highest FIPS validation in the industry, our award-winning SecureDrive® devices give you the flexibility of choosing the level of control that best fits your data security plan. SecureDrive® KP and SecureUSB® KP hard disk and flash drives authenticate users via an onboard alpha-numeric keypad and a PIN of up to 15 digits.
Our Remote Management (RM) License can be added to an unlimited number of SecureDrive® BT devices at any time and offers geo- and time-fencing, remote wipe and forced password reset, and user logging. The RM console gives administrators total control over the enforcement of data handling policies. It also provides unparalleled security when an external drive is stolen or lost.
And all SecureDrive® devices come equipped with one year of free DriveSecurity® (by ClevX) antivirus protection. DriveSecurity® requires no host installation and automatically scans for and removes malware. It’s self-learning and detects threats even without an internet connection. DriveSecurity® detects malware threats before they can spread from external devices to networked computers.