Backups are an essential line of protection against ransomware, but external storage and hard drives may need to be more convenient and unpleasant. While cloud-based backups are more effective, they could also be a target for fraudsters when they need to be adequately safeguarded. Furthermore, ransomware attacks now target critical data assets like backups and production databases.
When the malefactors encrypt your backups, you have two options: pay the ransom or forget about your data. Fortunately, there are various methods for protecting your backups from ransomware assaults. This post will describe the leading solutions for making your backups foolproof.
Ransomware Backup Best Practices
Before we look at strategies to safeguard backups against ransomware, let’s talk about the best practices for establishing tie-ups in the first place.
Concentrate On the Ultimate Result
A backup’s ultimate goal is to retrieve company operations with less data loss successfully. When developing a ransomware backup plan, keep your final goal in mind. Once you’ve determined which essential business functions you will require to recover in the case of an attack, you can start developing a backup strategy.
Also read: How to Protect Yourself Against Ransomware
Backup As If Your Data Is About to Be Assaulted
Last year in 2022, 75% of firms were hit by a ransomware assault. These companies had an average of six days of downtime. Ransomware assaults are no longer an if but rather a when. Planning is essential, and selecting the proper partner to back up your email data allows you to be one step ahead of hackers. Furthermore, correctly stored, and encrypted cloud-based backups are more challenging for attackers to locate and compromise.
Make a Multi-Pronged Strategy to Combat Ransomware Assaults
Backups are an excellent way to safeguard your company against ransomware. It is vital to consider more preventive measures to battle ransomware, such as software that examines incoming emails for harmful attachments or Security Awareness Training to engage staff in keeping your firm safe.
More importantly, incorporating a cybersecurity ecosystem of partners built to provide end-to-end ransomware protection reduces the risk of it moving across your environment.
Ransomware Backup Strategies
Here are some efficient methods for protecting your company’s backup data from ransomware assaults.
Implement the 3-2-1 Backup Strategy
The 3-2-1 backup plan is the most common and among the most balanced backup systems available. It asserts that you must always have three copies of a single file: a backup copy on an offsite storage medium, a backup copy on a local storage media, and the original file. When your original data is compromised, you could restore it from local storage because it is faster. When your local backup and original data are compromised, you could fix them using cloud storage.
Utilize Several Cloud Storage Options
Incorporating another cloud storage option into your existing storage stack will improve the protection level.
- A unique collection of credentials. To begin with, if attackers breach your identity policy and assault one storage, odds are the second one, with varied credentials, will remain secure, and you will be able to retrieve it.
- Different backup intervals. Backups might become worthless when ransomware infects the original data but goes unreported. The backup method uploads the modified data, encrypting the most recent backup.
Restricting Accessibility to Backup Applications and Storage
In all honesty, no end user must have access to backup storage. Additionally, you want to restrict access to those who require access to such storage. You may lessen the likelihood that an attempt to attack your backups effectively will succeed by creating a thoughtful access policy.
However, there is a second attack vector when it comes to backup. The service or backup program itself, because it often has accessibility to both backup storage and user data, is to blame. When you utilize a centrally managed backup system, establish a firm security policy, and do not provide authorization to view your backup dashboard.
Air-Gap Backups
Among the most effective and also one of the most demanding ransomware backup security strategies is this one. When there is an air gap, your backup storage is removed from your building. It’s also not linked to any local, cloud-based, or network. A local storage solution, such as a file server, NAS, or hard drive that you connect to your property only whenever you need to conduct a backup, is what the phrase air-gap backup means.
Retention Settings
The number of copies of your data retained at the backup storage and how long they are kept there are determined by a set of rules and regulations called retention settings. To ensure that you can always recover from an earlier backup copy, even when your most recent backup copy is contaminated, a well-thought-out retention strategy will enable you to preserve at least one extra copy of your backups.
Observe The Patterns of Network Access
Typically, ransomware enters your network via files that users unintentionally download or through injection by an intruder with access to your network. You must monitor abnormal network behavior, like many unsuccessful log-in attempts or log-ins from strange sources or at suspicious times, to safeguard yourself against injections.
There is SIEM-style software that could monitor network traffic and provide reports instantly to aid you with this. However, remember that such programs may need to be more balanced for smaller enterprises regarding the feature set and the cost.
Proper Education
Regardless of the security measures you take and how sophisticated your security policy is, your users will seek a way through the barriers. The biggest threat to data security comes from end users, who are also essentially your final line of defense. Therefore, you must teach them so that they know the kinds of links and emails they should not read, the kinds of attachments they should not download, and who to contact for assistance if they download such files or open such emails.
Also read: Top 8 Encryption Software for 2023
Security via Encryption
Encrypting your data and filenames is still essential, even if it won’t protect you against ransomware, because even after encryption, your backup data may still be re-encrypted and rendered worthless.
Why? If any personal data is compromised, a successful data breach becomes more severe if your business is subject to regulatory requirements. Such personal information is usually included in data, like filenames. Therefore, file and filename encryption aids in avoiding expensive compliance fines.
Conclusion
Some claim no backup protection strategy is 100% secure against ransomware attacks. While this is true, the likelihood of being successfully struck will be significantly decreased by a complicated and well-considered series of activities. Additionally, a corporation may suffer severe financial and operational consequences due to data loss during a ransomware assault. Reducing the time, it takes for a firm to recover is crucial, and working with a software solution makes this possible.
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