November 2024

As we are now well underway in 2024/Q4, I must – yet again – conclude that the cyber threat landscape is “the talk-of-the-town”. Not many customer and partner conversations this year have escaped a certain focus on cybercrime. The threat landscape has evolved dramatically over the last five years, characterised by the rise of sophisticated ransomware and phishing attacks that pose significant risks to companies and organizations across all sectors.

Evolving Cyber Threat Landscape and Its Impact on Data Protection Services

Ransomware attacks have become not only more frequent but also more diligent. This development emphasizes the need for comprehensive data protection strategies, where reliable backup solutions are essential for effective recovery and business continuity.

Alongside ransomware, phishing attacks have evolved, too. While this development certainly emphasizes the necessity for strengthening defenses against phishing, it also underscores the need for a diligent separation-of-duties governance framework as a critical data protection component in any robust cybersecurity strategy.

The New Normal: Targeting Backup Environments and Administrators

Cybercriminals are increasingly focusing on backup environments and backup administrators as a strategic tactic designed to maximize the impact of their attacks. In our many conversations with customers and partners, we often detail the severe implications for organizations in this context:

Access to Dual Environments: By compromising backup systems, attackers gain access not only to production environments but also to critical backups. This dual access allows them to manipulate or delete vital data, effectively crippling an organization’s operational capability.

Data Integrity and Recovery Risks: Targeting backups undermines the integrity of recovery processes. If backup data is corrupted or encrypted by ransomware, organizations face significant challenges in restoring operations. This in turn may lead to extended downtime, potential financial losses and maybe irreparable reputational damage.

Increased Ransom Demands: It is a well-known fact that cybercriminals leverage the knowledge of backup vulnerabilities to either demand higher ransoms or reject negotiations seeking to lower the demanded ransom. Organizations may feel pressured to pay to regain access to their data, escalating the financial impact and potential for repeated attacks.

Regulatory Compliance Threats: And as if all the above isn’t challenging enough, organizations that fail to protect their backup environments risk non-compliance with industry regulations, leading to potential fines and reputational damage.

Next Stop: Convergence of Data Protection and Backup Services

As far as we are concerned at B4Restore, the escalating cyber threats necessitate a reevaluation of data protection frameworks.

Simply put, organizations must prioritize integrated backup services as a fundamental aspect of their security posture to ensure data availability and enable rapid recovery in the event of an attack. Furthermore, compliance with evolving regulations demands that organizations implement strong data protection measures to safeguard sensitive information.

Strategic Focus on Mitigation, Governance and Resilience Through Backup-as-a-Service

To effectively navigate the evolving cyber threat landscape, organizations must adapt their cybersecurity measures, and we have documented that this can be done through adopting our Backup-as-a-Service.

B4Restore distinguishes itself from other Data Protection as a Service providers by focusing on stringent security, compliance, and ease of integration into existing IT infrastructures. Additionally, B4Restore’s architecture and cloud-native orchestration platform support seamless scalability for high-volume data workloads, making it well-suited for both enterprises and MSPs requiring robust data protection and quick recovery capabilities in both complex, and regulated environments.

Some say if while others say when

At B4Restore we can go along with “hope for the best”, but our data protection services are always “prepared for the worst”.

B4Restore ensures restoration after cyber incidents through a multi-layered Backup-as-a-Service (BaaS) approach. Our solution includes air-gapped backups, which isolate critical data from active networks, significantly reducing the risk of ransomware tampering.

Additionally, B4Restore enforces a strict separation-of-duties governance framework, which limits access to sensitive backup data, protecting against insider threats and unauthorized changes. With certifications like ISO 27001 & 22301 and ISAE 3402, we guarantee compliance and data integrity, supporting reliable and swift data restoration even after sophisticated attacks.

Do the right thing…

No. 1 Protect Your Business Confidently

• B4Restore has been protecting customers’ critical data for more than 20 years.

No.2 Leverage a High-Performance Data Protection Service

• B4Restore’s Backup-as-a-Service executes more than 70,000,000 backup jobs annually.

No. 3 Identify and Hire a Certified Managed Services Provider

• B4Restore’s information security standard is ISO 27001 certified.
• B4Restore’s Business Continuity Management approach is ISO 22301 certified.
• B4Restore has the independent service auditor’s ISAE 3000 assurance report.