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Backup cybersecurity is a collection of practices and tools that ensure the safety and privacy of duplicate data in an alternative storage location.
Security precautions are required both while the data is in transit and stationary. Backup security protects against unauthorized access, data corruption, and data leaks, and safeguards it for when it’s needed.
See below to learn all about the global backup security market:
Backup security market
The backup security market is a segment of the big data security market, which was estimated at $19.5 billion in 2021. It’s expected to maintain a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 16% over the analysis period from 2021 to 2026, reaching $47.9 billion by the end of it.
Regionally, the global backup security market is segmented as follows:
- The U.S. market was estimated at $6.1 billion in 2021, with a 31.2% share
- The Chinese market is forecast for a CAGR of 20.6% over the analysis period, reaching $10.6 billion by 2026
- Japan and Canada are forecast to grow at a CAGR of 11.5% and 14% over the forecast period
- Within Europe, Germany is projected to maintain one of the highest CAGRs at 12.6%
By industry, the global market encompasses the following sectors:
- IT
- Health care
- Finance and insurance
- Retail
- Utilities
Backup security features
Ensuring the safety and security of data in the backup isn’t a single checkbox to tick. It’s a scale that varies in the level of security depending on the data protection strategies implemented during the transit and storage steps of the backup procedure.
Achieving adequate backup security relies primarily on securing the various components and steps that go into it, such as:
Secure communication channels
Data backup requires multiple updates that puts the data at risk while being transferred from the primary storage facility to the backup locations.
Securing communications through encryption and network segmentation is essential to ensuring the data packets don’t get intercepted.
Employing ransomware solutions
While general antimalware protection is necessary, backup data is more often targeted by ransomware attacks.
Specialized anti-ransomware solutions are able to actively recognize and interrupt malicious code and behavior before it attacks.
Securing the storage location
Whether it’s stored on-site or in the cloud, backup locations require their own protection strategies and emergency protocols to keep safe. This includes securing the physical hardware of backup locations and limiting unauthorized access to them.
Limiting data access privileges
Access to backup data should be exclusive to individuals involved in the backup and recovery process. Providing unnecessary access privileges increases the number of possible attack avenues.
Using multiple backup locations
A backup of a backup can act as the ‘Plan B’ for highly critical data that your organizations cannot lose access to under any circumstances. This can include multiple cloud storage locations or a separation between cloud and on-site backups.
Using storage encryption
In order to secure backup data at rest, strong encryption protocols are needed. While strong encryption tends to make access to data more cumbersome even to authorized individuals, backup data is able to afford the added hurdle as it’s not accessed as often.
Vetting third-party providers
When working with third-party service providers for any part of the backup process—whether it’s network communication or servers—it’s important to ensure they follow strict regulations when it comes to data security and privacy.
SaaS and backup security
Backup can be a complex operation to integrate into an already-established infrastructure of devices, systems, and servers. Introducing security into the mix, backup steps need to be planned and monitored constantly for any abnormalities.
While relying exclusively on software-as-a-service (SaaS) tools as part of backup security isn’t sufficient, it tends to a lower barrier of entry for organizations. It also enables them to pay per use instead of upfront investment, and they can be more easily integrated into existing backup mechanisms and improve on them.
“SaaS applications can also seamlessly integrate to existing mechanisms in place — such as multi-factor authentication for identity management — and SaaS providers often offer expertise in designing, configuring, optimizing, and managing a solution that the data center may not have,” says Dave Russell, VP of enterprise strategy at Veeam, in a post at Spiceworks.
“Over-relying on these backups can have consequences. For one, organizations do not have as much control over the service delivery or the infrastructure it runs upon. While that can be seen as a benefit, it is a drawback if an incident arises.”
Benefits of backup security
Prioritizing backup security can have many benefits for the average organization, from small businesses and startups to megacorporations and enterprises.
Some benefits of backup security include:
- Mitigating the risks of ransomware attacks
- Meeting compulsory and complementary security regulations
- Gaining the trust of clients and customers
- Avoiding data loss in case of an emergency
- Minimizing the risk of a data leak
“Prepare for hackers with fail-safes, like image-based backups, to set your company up for disaster recovery and misbehaving employees,” says Will Foret, member of the Forbes Business Council.
“To ensure you are not in the burning-money category, consider using an image-based backup that takes hourly snapshots of your system and backs up in two completely separate locations with a different operating system than the one you use every day,” adds Foret.
Backup security use cases
Security for backup solutions needs to adapt to meet backup strategies and solutions where they are. Following are examples of multiple backup security solutions in various industries and circumstances.
Hutchinson and Bloodgood
Glendale, California-based Hutchinson and Bloodgood is a provider of certified public accounting services for tax planning, auditing, as well as information technology consulting.
Moving from one backup service to the next, Hutchinson and Bloodgood had a hard time finding a provider to settle with long-term.
Looking for a superior and multi-tenant cloud approach to data backup, it reached out to Dropsuite. Dropsuite was able to provide Hutchinson and Bloodgood with the custom services and features it sought for backup.
“Whenever we had questions, Dropsuite got back to us very quickly and happily took feature and enhancement requests,” says Christopher White, a partner at Hutchinson and Bloodgood.
“Compared to other vendors, the ease of setup was astounding. I was expecting something much more painful. Dropsuite’s streamlining of initial authentication and authorization was superior to other solutions we evaluated. It’s very straightforward and my level one techs were able set up all clients in about two days.”
Working with Dropsuite, Hutchinson and Bloodgood was able to acquire a long-term, secure, and reliable backup solution that’s easy to implement and maintain.
Evalueserve
Evalueserve is a provider of artificial intelligence (AI) data analytics software with many Fortune “500” customers. Based in Zug, Switzerland, it has a global team of over 4,500 experts working with users across industries.
Evalueserve realized that using legacy disk-based backup wasn’t reliable or fast across its multiple data locations. It was also looking for a way to ensure its data was always secure and mitigate unforeseen cyber threats.
Reaching out to Commvault, Evalueserve implemented the Commvault Complete Data Protection to secure its data across storage and backup locations and automate emergency recovery.
“Thanks to the encryption and security feature with Commvault, it gives us confidence that our backup copies are in a complete locked state and cannot be touched in the event of ransomware attacks,” says Sachin Jain, then CIO and CISO at Evalueserve.
“Unauthorized access to data can also be eliminated by using the role-based access control with Commvault Command Center.”
Working with Commvault, Evalueserve was able to double the speed of data recovery, double its storage capacity, and gain confidence in the security and safety of its backup.
Panasonic
Panasonic is one of the world’s largest manufacturers of consumer electronics and batteries as well as automotive, avionic, and industrial systems. Based in Osaka, Japan, Panasonic’s has around 280,000 employees.
With unparalleled growth, Panasonic was struggling to scale its backup strategy without compromising on efficiency and security.
After careful consideration, Panasonic settled on Parablu’s recommended solution; BluVault Backup to OneDrive as a SaaS-based and no on-premises footprint as its primary backup solution.
“After evaluating several backup solutions, we chose Parablu’s BluVault because it was the only solution that offered more than just backup and restores functionality,” says Ramneet Singh, senior manager, IT Infrastructure, Panasonic India.
”We are recommending it to our other groups and subsidiary companies. Their technical support has been great and they’re overall a highly responsive and great team to work with. Highly recommended.”
With Parablu, Panasonic was able to deploy a highly scalable and secure backup solution with centralized management and no on-premises storage costs.
Backup security providers
Some of the leading providers of backup security in the market include:
- Continuity Software
- Altaro
- IBM
- Barracuda
- Carbonite
- Code42
- Commvault
- Datto
- Dell EMC
- Druva
