Airgap: Data Protection in the Old Frontier

With all the talk about ransomware and cybersecurity breaches, many have wondered – what data protection strategy should I be deploying? How can I ensure that I have another copy of my data that is isolated (and by isolated, I mean that if ransomware does crypto-lock my data, I can go to my “safe deposit box” and restore my data center)? Ironically, we have been preaching to our customers over the last few years that tape is dead and should be replaced with disk-based backup storage or cloud repositories for long-term retention. Now I have to face those same customers and tell them that the best way to airgap their data is to archive their backups to tape. Yes, it sounds old school, but it is the best way to remain protected from all the modern threats to your data.

As we approach the end of 2019, it’s important to think back to the accomplishments and lessons learned this year. I am fortunate to lead a team of highly talented Data Center Solutions Architects, and we’ve had a very busy year. One of the new things we’re offering in 2019 is a Data Center Resiliency Workshop, which is a two-hour workshop we conduct with customers. We ask over 160 questions and evaluate eight technologies:

Recently, I read an article that an organization gets hit by ransomware every 14 seconds. In 2021, it is expected that it will be every 11 seconds. That is a very sobering statistic. Consequently, there is not one day in the life of an IT person that the subject of ransomware goes unmentioned or undiscussed. Today alone, I had two meetings with customers who wanted to talk about Cyber Recovery. In both meetings, I could hear the worried tone in the customers’ voices as they asked questions about Cyber Recovery solutions.

Just recently, one of my customers—a large K-12 School District—was hit by a major ransomware breach. Just how major was it? The breach was so major that the whole (and I really mean the WHOLE) data center was inoperable. Primary data and backup data was encrypted beyond usability.  Management systems of production devices and the backup application systems were compromised beyond recoverability. Active Directory and authentication capabilities were locked out. The result was that the data center became a bunch of bare-metal hardware with blinking lights.

Every morning when I get up, there are a series of apps that I fire up to gather my daily dose of information that fuels my personal, financial, and work life. In this day and age, I need to access the data on my mobile device/smartphone or PC anywhere and at any time. For all practical purposes, I really don’t care how that information is processed behind the scenes.

Isn’t that typical of how we consume information in today’s digital transformation age? Being a technical person, I do understand how this information is produced and delivered, but most of us just want the information when we demand it – we don’t care about how it gets to us. That is, until our business is the one that must provide the data to consumers, who demand convenient access to it at all times. So, how does data get delivered to consumers’ devices of choice?

There are a lot of new terms these days around data center networking. Software-defined-this and that-as-a-service are among the leaders. Neither of these are new concepts in technology, but emphasize a new way of looking at how data centers work. Networks have already been “software-defined” and virtualized for an incredibly long time, but now the emphasis is on abstracting the intent from the configuration and treating the entire network as a system. Cisco’s entry into software-defined networking (SDN) is its Application Centric Infrastructure (ACI). ACI has a lot of new concepts and terminology, especially around the abstraction mentioned earlier, but that will not be our current focus.

Recently, I have been talking to many customers about data center resiliency as part of ConvergeOne’s Data Center Foundation Workshops. Before beginning an implementation, it’s important to know where customers are at, so I start by asking them if they would be able to recover from a data center failure in their current state.

It’s time to step up your game.

In order to thrive in the coming years, most businesses must undergo digital transformation. According to Gartner, 67% of business leaders believe that in order to remain competitive, their organization will have to undergo significant digitalization by 2020. With digital initiatives serving as the top priority for 2019 according to Gartner's CIO Agenda 2019, it sounds like many organizations are already in the midst of successful digital transformation, right? Not so fast. Forrester Research reports a bleak state of digital transformation, with many companies failing to realize the full extent of their transformational opportunities.

In my last blog post, I discussed the differences between hyper-converged infrastructure and traditional data center infrastructure. Now that you understand the value of shifting to hyper-converged infrastructure, what do you do next? Let’s say you’re preparing for your data center refresh. You’re planning for some growth in storage and performance, and you have to future-proof for the next three or perhaps even five years. Not only that, but you also have to reduce your total cost of ownership (TCO), which involves reducing your data center space, cooling, and power. You’ll be looking to streamline your operations and gain cost efficiencies along the way, too.