Rick Vanover, Senior Director of Product Strategy di Veeam, highlights the upgrade to the 3-2-1 rule, the 85% risk and other numbers to remember.
This is not a new rule, but it definitely needs an update given the current state of cyber threats and attacks ransomware. The 3-2-1 rule is an excellent data management principle which requires the presence of 3 (or more) copies of data on 2 (or more) different media, of which at least 1 is off-site. This rule is very useful because it doesn’t indicate a particular hardware technology and is suitable for almost all scenarios.
Lifetime of 99.999999999%:
Object storage has been designed to provide 99.999999999% year-to-year life, which is something that many professionals find interesting. Cloud and object storage are nothing new, but they have clearly demonstrated how scalable, durable, and available they can be. It’s now important that object storage also takes the 3-2-1 rule seriously.
85% of companies have experienced a Ransomware attack
The Veeam Ransomware Trends Report 2022 indicates that the majority (85%) of companies have experienced at least one ransomware attack in the last year. It’s no longer about if or when, but how often it will happen.
How can this information be? Building on market expertise and accepting the reality of today’s threats. Ransomware is the disaster that, according to the numbers, is much more likely to strike than a scenario of physical disasters, such as fires and floods. So let’s use one of the most resilient types of storage: object storage, and leverage one of the most unique aspects of its value: immutability.
On this World Backup Day 2023, double down on the 3-2-1 rule with two non-production copies of backup data on immutable targets, possibly both on object storage. Imagine an implementation of the 3-2-1 rule where both separate copies are immutable object storage – a very resilient solution!
How can we meet the logical requirement of an offsite copy?
We could use cloud on-premises (inherently offsite), choose different cloud regions (definitely offsite) for the two copies, and we could opt for different cloud availability zones and subscriptions (logically offsite and abstract). The cloud and the world of object storage provide so many applications of the 3-2-1 rule that there is no longer a valid reason not to choose a backup infrastructure that is highly resilient and capable of providing a high likelihood of being able to recover data in the event of a ransomware attack.