Can’t see the forest through the trees. Can’t tell the ransomware from the apps. Can’t contain the malware if you can only see parts of the network.
Ransomware hackers have several different tools in their toolbelt to gain access to a computer and then a network. Common exploits include email phishing campaigns, remote desktop protocol (RDP) vulnerabilities, and software vulnerabilities.
But once ransomware infects your network is when the real struggle begins – and it’s not to find the budget to pay their demands. You need to locate the infected data, contain it, identify the most recent un-impacted backup, and recover as quickly as possible. The longer it takes to locate and contain the attack, the longer your environment will be down. The longer it takes your team to determine the extent of the damage, the longer your business is on hold.
Out with the old, in with the new unified data protection system
A problem many organizations face when dealing with ransomware is outdated data protection systems. Data protection, otherwise known as backup and recovery, is fundamental to IT and has been around for decades. For many, their backup technology has also been around for decades.
Legacy data protection technology is vulnerable. Part of that vulnerability stems from the siloed functionality and lack of visibility afforded by legacy systems. Legacy solutions, over time, tend to accumulate a hodgepodge of applications, diminishing business value and complicating both operations and security. Such segregation also makes it nearly impossible to know exactly where you’re housing all the critical data you’re working so hard to protect.
55% of organizations use more than 20 tools across IT Operations and Security
93% of CIOs report that IT’s ability to maximize value for the business is hindered by data silos
40% of CIOs say silos make it difficult to identify the severity of an issue and minimize business impact
The best response to a ransomware infection is to quarantine the affected data and quickly recover from trusted, immutable backups. A modernized data security solution, like Rubrik Security Cloud, provides better visibility, improved security, and increased business value.
It also provides peace of mind. If your organization is the victim of a ransomware attack, you have only to contain and remove the attack and restore the backup—helping avoid a call to your cyber insurance provider or pay out a ransom.
Keep calm and restore on
It is common knowledge that the fastest, most painless way to recover from a ransomware attack is to restore your data from immutable backups. So threat actors have now taken to attacking the backups themselves, compromising and encrypting data stored in vulnerable legacy systems. When that occurs, organizations wind up in an unrecoverable state, forced to pay the ransom. And even after the ransom is paid, the recovery can be painful and lengthy, and there is no guarantee that all files will be returned untouched—or undisclosed. Implementing a zero trust data security defense will ensure your organization can restore and recover from an attack with little to no downtime.
According to the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), “zero trust is the term for an evolving set of cybersecurity paradigms that move defenses from static, network-based perimeters to focus on users, assets, and resources. A zero trust architecture uses zero trust principles to plan industrial and enterprise infrastructure and workflows. Zero trust assumes there is no implicit trust granted to assets or user accounts based solely on their physical or network location (i.e., local area networks versus the internet) or asset ownership (enterprise or personally owned).”
Microsoft & Rubrik: A partnership built on zero trust
Rubrik Zero Trust Data Security™ is an architecture developed from the Zero Trust Implementation Model from NIST. When enterprises and government agencies utilize Rubrik Security Cloud, criminals cannot modify, delete, or encrypt data, ensuring that a clean copy is readily available for recovery.
Many organizations rely on Microsoft 365 applications. Accordingly, Microsoft 365 is the target of an escalating number of attacks. Microsoft and Rubrik partnered to address this security issue and are simplifying the process of protecting hybrid cloud environments by giving customers a zero trust data security strategy, including the unified management of Microsoft 365, data center, and cloud applications.
Building on their long-standing partnership, Rubrik and Microsoft now provide Microsoft 365 with hybrid cloud data protection and integrated cloud services on Microsoft Azure. Rubrik addresses the most pressing data challenges for enterprises: rapid recovery from ransomware, automation of data operations, and the transition of data to the cloud. The Rubrik and Microsoft collaboration brings these offerings to the next level, providing Zero Trust data protection for hybrid cloud environments spanning data center, edge, and cloud, including Microsoft 365.
And you can say goodbye to application blind spots and data silos. Rubrik integrates directly with Azure Blob storage, Azure VM snapshots, and Azure Managed Disk snapshots to provide a seamless management experience for cloud archival, cloud-native, and Microsoft 365 data.
To learn more about this exciting partnership and how it can help you win the war on ransomware, download Take the Fear Out of Ransomware with Zero Trust Data Security.