Consider Air-Gapped Backups

I’m guessing that we’ve all dealt with a computer virus or malware at some point in our lives. Dealing with these issues can range from annoying to absolutely devastating.

Even at their worst, viruses or malware are not typically on the same level as a ransomware attack. Sure, you may hate not being able to access your games or documents on your laptop due to a virus. But when a company is attacked with ransomware there are more financial complications.

Ransomware has picked up steam in recent years, making the idea of keeping backups air-gapped more appealing.

Air-Gapped Backups?

Air-gapped backups are backups located where there is no connection to the internet or perhaps no network connection at all. Tape storage is one method that could be considered air-gapped. StoneFly has their DR365VIVA specifically built for air-gapped backups.

When there’s no network connection, you should be safe from the nightmare scenario where your critical data is encrypted and you’re faced with the decision of paying a large sum of money to (hopefully) get your data back.

Things can go from bad to worse if you pay a ransom but still end up with files that aren’t decrypted.

Let’s say you have no available backups and your database gets encrypted. You might pay the ransom to have it decrypted and find that the log file decrypted successfully but the data files did not. That doesn’t help you. It’s best to have valid backups and not rely on the morality of ransomware terrorists.

Nice to Have or Must Have?

We know we always want multiple copies, multiple locations, etc. so what about keeping backups air-gapped? This extra layer of protection can help meet compliance requirements for laws and frameworks such as HIPAA and HITRUST. It can also help with meeting requirements for cyber insurance coverage.

Security experts expect attacks to continue increasing in 2022. Do yourself a favor and consider air-gapped backups. In the event of an attack, your environment might be affected but your air-gapped backups should be safe. If it hasn’t already, 2022 is going to push air-gapped backups from being “nice to have” to “must have” in any backup strategy.

Thanks for reading!