Tag: data recovery

The C-suite has long left data resilience and cybersecurity in the hands of security and IT teams. It has been a case of ‘leave it to the experts’, and for a long time, that made sense. But as organisations have become increasingly dependent on technology and breaches have become a case of ‘when’ rather than ‘if,’ cybersecurity has become a part of everyone’s day-to-day.

As organisations emerge from the recent CrowdStrike Falcon incident, I have taken some time to reflect on what we learn from this. Over the past few days, we have seen so many responses and opinions on apportioning liability and estimating the impact of the incident. This point of view takes a different perspective, reflecting on how to respond positively and in a forward-looking way.

In the ever-evolving digital landscape of today, where data stands as the new currency, the demand for skilled data management professionals has become ever apparent. As a critical, ethical, legal and operational concern in modern business, data protection and management are essential for maintaining business continuity.

We commissioned an independent, vendor-agnostic survey of 3,000 IT/cybersecurity leaders in mid-sized organisations (100-5,000 employees) across 14 countries, including 200 respondents in South Africa.

Ransomware attacks have dominated the headlines over the last two years and will continue to control the cybersecurity agenda going into 2023. While ransomware gangs continue to be successful in extorting money from businesses, those that do pay demands are financing the ransomware industry and further crime.

The statistics make for worrying reading. According to our Data Protection Trends Report 2022, 97% of South African companies experienced an outage due to a cyberattack in the past 12 months. Of those, almost nine in 10 (86%) suffered a ransomware attack.

Impacts vary, but in many cases, ransomware disrupts businesses for significant periods or even forces them to suspend operations or close. A growing population of highly capable cyber extortionists is developing a new means to counter defences and increase the level of disruption they can inflict constantly.

Work from Home (WFH) is here to stay, and it has changed the way we access business data. The monolithic server structure has firmly given way to cloud-based storage systems that enable anytime, anywhere access, along with greater flexibility and agility – as well as new challenges.

The benefits of migrating into the cloud have long been evident. However, certain challenges have held the Financial Services Industry (FSI) organisations back from fully embracing the flexibility, agility and cost effectiveness of cloud-based solutions, particularly with regard to data storage.

There is a significant decrease in the sheer number of ransomware attacks due to improved security, better backup strategies and faster data recovery measures. This has meant that the spray and pray approach is no longer effective for ransomware distribution. Although fewer ransoms are being paid, it doesn't mean less risk.