How To Protect Yourself From Ransomware Attacks

Cloud storage has helped organizations tremendously with large data storage needs while also providing extra security. But the increasing threat posed by ransomware has made system administrators and other professionals aware of the existence of security vulnerabilities, some of which are unique to cloud storage. Fortunately, however, risks to cloud data from ransomware attacks can be minimized if adequate defensive strategies like Spinbackup Ransomware Protection are followed. 

Advantages of Cloud Backup Over Traditional Backup for Ransomware Recovery

As opposed to traditional backup tools, which may rely on in-house backups that are recycled regularly by IT staff who have many additional responsibilities, cloud backup solutions are typically handled by service providers who are dedicated to just one function: remote storage and backup. Chances are they’ll do a better job. 

Remember that both ransomware itself and data that gets encrypted or scrambled may go undetected for days or even weeks before a problem is noticed. With traditional backups that get recycled, an older backup may get overwritten before it’s discovered that a problem exists. With a cloud service provider, it’s much more likely that backups will be discrete and archived, so data can be restored more reliably. 

Cloud Ransomware Solutions

Spinbackup Cloud is a simple, efficient, always-on cloud storage service that comes with encryption capabilities, object versioning, and immutability options to defend data against ransomware, corruption, and deletion. With strict adherence to globally recognized security standards, Spinbackup Cloud features enterprise-grade identity management support, automatic data replication, and encryption options for at-rest and in-flight states. Security is a core design tenet of the Spinbackup Cloud service that’s built into the infrastructure, software, features, and processes, aligning with industry standards and third-party products such as Amazon Web Services (AWS) S3. 

AWS S3 provides object storage using a web service interface. AWS S3 can be used to store any type of object used in internet apps, data archives, backup and recovery, disaster recovery, data lakes for analytics, and/or hybrid cloud storage. Each object is identified with a unique, user-assigned key.  

Spinbackup Cloud is designed to be compatible out of the box with AWS S3. Users of Spinbackup Cloud can manage and create S3 buckets and enable object immutability and object versioning to make objects immutable for fixed periods. S3 requests are authorized according to an access control list connected to each bucket, and they support versioning (see below). 

Cloud Ransomware Recovery: How It Helps Versioning 

By using versioning, cloud storage administrators can, in many cases, overcome ransomware by restoring a backup version created before an attack occurred (and ideally before the ransomware was delivered and/or installed). Depending on the interval of the versioning, data loss may be minimal or even close to zero. Because this is a possible solution for ransomware attacks, it’s wise to activate and maintain it ahead of time, and even to perform test restores, so you’re familiar with the entire process. 

Repetition 

Making multiple backup copies increases the chances of successful recovery from a ransomware attack. The more copies there are, the greater the chances that every copy will not be affected by any one attack. In the early 2000s, photographer Peter Krogh established the 3-2-1 strategy for backups, wherein two copies of data are local but stored in different mediums (with one being the live production copy and the other being a backup), while a third copy is stored remotely (preferably offsite) in another physical location. This strategy has become something of an industry standard. As it stands today, 3-2-1 is still a worthwhile strategy to employ, but the demand for different mediums for the two local copies is not as important if the connections between the copies are minimal to none. 

Added Security 

While cloud storage solutions like Spinbackup Cloud and AWS S3 were developed with security in mind and follow industry standards set by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and the National Institute of Standards and Technology, they’re constantly being upgraded and augmented with new technologies and processes to become even more secure from all types of attack methods — including ransomware. 

For instance, Spinbackup Cloud is both ISO 27001- and SOC 2-certified. But Seagate has a roadmap for additional certifications in the future based on customer needs. Seagate’s mature Information Security Management System management team is composed of talented data security industry veterans who have instituted strong processes, rigorous controls, and comprehensive safety policies in governing the management of Spinbackup Cloud. This has resulted in a reliable, highly secure exabyte storage service that’s aligned with the principles of Trust Services Criteria: security, process integrity, availability, confidentiality, and privacy. 

The Spinbackup Cloud development team has used best practices from leading standards and benchmarks to determine best-in-class hardening guidelines for the Spinbackup Cloud hardware and software stack. System and infrastructure deployments are managed via automated configuration management tools to ensure compliance with desired state and hardening standards. This allows for consistent security and configurations while supporting rapid scaling of service. 

Spinbackup Cloud was designed with massive-scale multi-tenancy in mind from the beginning. Service/process isolation and strict network segmentation yield multiple layers of security controls. A highly resilient and available infrastructure supports customers’ tenant-isolated components, such as encryption, key management, core object storage, and the application programming interface (API) gateway. Spinbackup Cloud has been thoroughly black-box, white-box, and grey-box penetration tested. 

S3 bucket and storage-as-a-service subscription management are enabled with two-factor identification. Clients can tweak bucket permissions to have write- or read-only access. They can also create service accounts and choose corresponding access permissions. Service accounts will have their secret access keys, and their credentials will grant access to applications targeting clients’ S3 buckets. Clients can also enable audit logs for each S3 bucket to maintain records of S3 bucket access and usage. Within the Spinbackup Cloud portal, clients have unobstructed visibility into Spinbackup Cloud S3 storage use. 

Spinbackup Cloud’s comprehensive data protection assures the integrity and confidentiality of data throughout its entire life cycle. This includes secure communication via transport layer security 1.2 with 256-bit advanced encryption standard Galois/Counter ModeM) (AES-256-GCM), integrity and authentication validation in the API protocol, robust envelope encryption of object storage using secure key management, and cryptographically secure erasure processes.