On July 18, 2024 Crowdstrike, a leader in cybersecurity, released an update that caused global outages for thousands of Microsoft Windows customers. While this doesn't directly affect Rubrik, we know that some data security vendors install their software on Microsoft Windows platforms. If the software itself is not installed on a Windows OS, they are likely using Microsoft SQL as the backend database for the software.
Data security vendors that build products on top of this architecture are struggling to help their customers restore business operations. Many affected environments had to be rebuilt first, before recovery.
These days, data is essential to the operation of your business. So the servers hosting that data—whether on-prem or in the cloud—are of utmost importance. When those servers go down, so does your business. So you must have a full understanding of your data security architecture, your vulnerabilities, and your business recovery plans.
Here are a few of questions you should ask as you evaluate any data security software that is your last line of defense during any unscheduled downtime, whether it is caused by a faulty software update or a malicious ransomware attack:
Are any components of my backup and recovery strategy dependent on 3rd party tools, updates, OS, SQL DB, etc.?
Does my backup and recovery solution depend on proxies for recovery? If so, how do you recover if those proxies are down?
How long would a rebuild of your data security software take in your current environment and what would that cost to your business?
These are questions that each customer should ask not only today but as they evaluate any data security solution. Below are a few ways that Rubrik can address the above questions for our customers:
Rubrik Secure Vault runs on a hardened Linux OS that is not dependent on any other tool or OS to recover.
Rubrik Secure Vault does not require any proxies or additional infrastructure outside of our nodes to recover.
Rubrik Secure Vault requires no rebuild of third-party components because we have no extra components needed for recovery. Rubrik can initiate recovery immediately after the incident.
It is due to this architecture that Rubrik customers were able to recover their Windows machines during this recent global outage. Furthermore, as a show of Rubrik's commitment to helping our customers we offered a temporary Enterprise Edition license upgrade for any customers needing bulk orchestrated recovery capabilities. Read more about that from Rubrik Field CTO & Josh Stenhouse here.
As ransomware gangs get smarter and are targeting more non-traditional ways to affect your business, lots of times the focus is lost around the foundational aspects of data security. Some might assume that servers will always be up, or that cloud workloads will always be up and that the only real risk in the technology estate is ransomware. While this generally may be the case most of the time, there is also potential for a black swan event to disrupt the digital economy.
Rubrik is here to help provide confidence in your ability to recover in these unfortunate events. Please reach out if you would like more information on how Rubrik can help you and your business recover during these difficult times.