It is crucial that cloud clients thoroughly understand how their data is backed up. Customers share the responsibility for protecting their cloud environment with their cloud service providers (CSPs). The CSP is typically responsible for backing up the infrastructure, including operating systems and component configurations. The customer is responsible for ensuring their data is backed up and available for recovery.
Some customers may have misconceptions regarding backing up their cloud data. Teams may assume that once they have migrated their data assets to the cloud, it is automatically safe and secure. This incorrect assumption can be dangerous and unnecessarily increase the risk of data loss or breaches.
Companies must be aware of how the following misconceptions pose threats to data security and availability, enabling them to take the necessary steps to protect their valuable assets.
CSPs Automatically Back Up All Your Data
The majority of cloud providers guarantee infrastructure availability, which requires backing up operating systems and infrastructure elements. The CSP is responsible for protecting the platform, not for safeguarding customer data residing in the cloud. Clients without additional backup solutions risk permanent data loss due to accidental deletion, application misconfiguration, or ransomware attacks.
Companies must implement an independent, policy-focused backup solution that aligns with business data retention and availability requirements. Teams must identify and protect all mission-critical workloads so they can be recovered efficiently to the cloud platform.
Cloud-Native Backup Solutions Offer Complete Data Protection
In many cases, a CSP offers cloud-native backups, providing companies with some degree of protection for customer data. Cloud clients may see this as a streamlined way to safeguard their data by leveraging the provider’s backup solution. The problem with this approach is that cloud-native backups are easy to implement but provide limited functionality compared to a viable cloud backup solution.
Decision-makers must be aware of the following limitations and potential drawbacks of relying on cloud-native backups for business-critical data.
- Storage efficiency: Native backup methods do not compress or deduplicate data, resulting in higher storage costs.
- Security: A third-party solution can provide security features, such as ransomware detection and insider threat protection, that cloud-native tools do not offer.
- Cost control: It can be challenging to control costs with cloud-native methods that charge for data egress or impose additional fees for cross-region support to enhance resilience.
- Application and platform data protection: Cloud-native tools may not provide backup support for all customer applications, and may be limited to a subset defined by the provider.
Businesses should strongly consider an independent backup solution that addresses the limitations and deficiencies of cloud-native tools.
SaaS Data is Automatically Protected
Many cloud customers make extensive use of Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) solutions such as Microsoft 365, Salesforce, or Google Workspace. SaaS providers typically offer limited data retention and recovery options that may not align with corporate policies. Teams may not have the granular recovery capabilities necessary to address deleted or expired files.
Organizations need to deploy a dedicated backup solution designed to effectively address the gaps and limitations of native SaaS backup abilities. The solution should enable teams to define retention parameters and provide point-in-time restore functionality.
Snapshots and Backups Offer Equivalent Data Protection
Teams may feel they are protecting their data by taking regularly scheduled snapshots of their cloud environment. This position can be dangerous, leading to extensive data loss and business disruptions. While snapshots serve a valid purpose and can be instrumental in facilitating test environments, they do not offer sufficient protection for business-critical data.
Snapshots suffer from several issues that make them an unacceptable solution for comprehensive backup.
- The snapshot is often stored in the production environment. If the environment is attacked or experiences a significant outage, the snapshot may not be available for recovery.
- Threat actors can delete or encrypt snapshots, rendering them worthless for recovery teams.
- Snapshots may require the production environment for recovery, limiting their ability to address data loss scenarios.
Businesses need immutable backups stored in an alternate environment to protect their cloud data. Companies cannot rely on a strategy of recovering via snapshots.
Encrypted Backup Data is Always Secure
Cloud vendors typically provide end-to-end encryption, including encrypting backup data. Customers may erroneously think that these backups are entirely secure and will be available for recovery if necessary. Recovery teams may encounter several issues that illustrate the danger of this misconception.
- Threat actors may compromise credentials and gain access by spoofing authorized users.
- Malicious external or internal entities may delete or overwrite backups.
- Ransomware attacks often target backup systems, making them unusable for recovery.
Companies can protect against these issues by creating immutable, tamper-proof backups. Teams should protect the backups with strict, least-privilege access methods.
Cloud Backups are Compliant by Default
Many customers leverage the cloud to implement a computing environment that meets regulatory compliance requirements, such as HIPAA, GDPR, or other government or industry regulations. Unfortunately, the fact that the platform offers security features necessary for compliance does not guarantee that backups are also compliant. Companies risk failed audits or regulatory penalties for issues such as:
- Insufficient and inflexible data retention rules;
- No support for legal holds;
- No long-term audit log retention.
A comprehensive third-party backup tool can be configured to align with all compliance standards.
VAST Solutions for Comprehensive Cloud Data Protection
We understand the importance of backing up and fully protecting your cloud environment, and we offer an independent solution that addresses the limitations of cloud-native backup methods. Our Cloud-Backup-as-a-Service (CBaaS) is a fully-managed solution built on Druva’s cutting-edge technology. It can handle the most complex cloud, hybrid, or on-premises computing environments. The solution eliminates the need to implement in-house backup infrastructure, fixed pricing, and immutable backups to protect against backup corruption.
We designed our CBaaS tool to support these four core areas of your IT environment:
- Microsoft 365 and other business-critical SaaS solutions;
- Public cloud implementations such as AWS and Azure environments;
- Hybrid and on-premises environments with complex dependencies;
- Enterprise endpoints to address the needs of a modern, mobile workforce.
VAST’s CBaaS offering provides comprehensive protection for your valuable cloud data.
Contact our backup experts and learn how easy it is to keep your cloud data protected and available for efficient recovery.
