[BreachExchange] Data protection: Necessary evil or competitive edge?

[Audrey McNeil]

http://www.financialexpress.com/article/industry/tech/data-protection-necessary-evil-or-competitive-edge/246501/

In an age where we are all becoming increasingly obsessed with data; its
protection has become a necessary burden for businesses. Investment in the
applications, mass storage, backup processes and training required to keep
this data safe is taking its toll on IT teams, that have little time to
sift through data and assess what really needs to be backed-up and how,
meaning for many companies the default approach is to simply backup
everything.

However as data sources continue to grow, many are asking how to turn data
protection from a run-the-business to a change-the-business process, and if
this essential operation can be made more efficient and cost effective.
Information is a company’s most important asset, but protecting this data
is an expensive and complex process. We noticed that for every $1 that a
company spends to keep customer information, it spends at least $4-6 to
protect it. For many of today’s organisation’s data protection is a form of
costly but essential insurance; offering a guard against data losses that
could damage brand reputation.

Advances in technology over the last five years have produced a number of
‘must have’ enterprise solutions—server virtualisation, Internet of Things,
data analytics and software-defined data centers. As a result, most
companies have in place at least three backup solutions to manage their
data protection needs. With IT budgets remaining the same while data
handling and analysis continue to skyrocket, it is unsurprising that many
companies are looking to reduce cost and optimise processes associated with
data protection. But where should they start? Here are a few things to
consider:

Protection should add value: The cost of protection should be commensurate
to the business value of the information. By clearly identifying what is
critical, important businesses can start to align processes with
requirements.

Why do you protect data in the first place?

For operational recovery—limited disaster such as data corruption

For disaster recovery —large scale disaster such as flooding or fire

For long-term recovery—to meet compliance requirements

This begins by understanding the different types of recovery and levels of
data importance. For example, core banking systems which are critical to a
bank’s operation should employ hardware-based snapshots for operational
recovery. While this approach costs more, it is essential to allow recovery
within minutes to keep the business going. This would also minimise data
loss and impact to users.

On the other end of the spectrum, things such as healthcare patient data,
which have to be kept for the length of a patient’s lifetime or more but
are not regularly accessed, can be moved on the right-hand side of the
spectrum—either in a private or public cloud as regulations dictate to
reduce costs. By taking the time to assess where their data sits,
businesses can begin to form a structured and cost effective approach to
data protection.

Fully leverage the cloud: The business case for using cloud to store backup
data can be compelling and there is a lot of pressure on IT departments to
adopt it. However, while cloud may be the fastest way to reduce cost, it
can also be the fastest way to introduce risk with issues around security,
flexibility and real costs all proving to be common concerns when it comes
to using the cloud.

Security concerns can be allayed with encryption and ensuring companies
ultimately ‘hold the key’ to their data. Understanding how much the cloud
will cost based on expected usage patterns requires planning, but ensures
businesses aren’t surprised by additional charges or system limitations.

Being able to ensure flexibility is a slightly harder task. Cloud providers
come and go rapidly, and IT is under pressure to adopt new systems, but
regularly migrating data can be risky. Companies need a ‘concierge to the
cloud’; a solution that can help move data between clouds as companies
please to take advantage of the latest cloud innovations without any
headaches is very critical.

Process transformation and consolidation: In the past, customers were
forced to take a best of breed approach in order to better support new
business requirements. However, this resulted in a lot of complexity. As
solutions catch up on trends, it is becoming easier to take a single
solution approach to support multiple applications in one place.

Do you build your own or buy purpose-built solutions? Businesses today are
expected to be agile enough to respond to ever-changing customer demands.
As a result, IT is no longer seen as just a provider but more of a partner
to the business, expected to consult on best-practice and oversee
transformation.

It may be tempting for some to want to build a custom data protection
solution to maintain complete control but this comes with a costly set of
storage solutions and applications, as well as a team to run them. By
opting instead for purpose-built integrated solutions, IT can free up time
that was previously used to maintain, upgrade and troubleshoot custom-built
systems to focus more on high value tasks while ensuring predictability in
both cost and maintenance.

The reality is that data will continue to take up a large part of IT
processes for the foreseeable future so now is the time to examine how
costs can be reduced and processes made more efficient. Rather than
approaching data protection with a single backup as ‘keep everything’
mindset, businesses now have far more flexibility to make savings and
ultimate get value from the data they are required to keep. A single
solution that can pull this all together is invaluable in the fight to get
value from data protection.
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