New Dell Technologies Report Unveils 'Uncertainty' Among Organizations for Recovery from Ransomware Attack

The Dell Technologies (NYSE:DELL) 2021 Global Data Protection Index (GDPI) findings reveal organizations are facing several data protection challenges driven by the constant threat of ransomware and the consumption of emerging technologies such as cloud-native applications, Kubernetes containers, and artificial intelligence.

According to a recent IDC survey, more than one-third of organizations worldwide have experienced a ransomware attack or breach that blocked access to systems or data in the previous 12 months. To help address these rising – and seemingly inevitable – issues, Dell Technologies is introducing new software and services to accelerate virtual machine (VM) backup data availability, simplify management of large data sets, and maintain business continuity while alleviating dependencies on day-to-day cyber recovery operations.

“As we move further in the data era, the amount of data being generated will continue to increase due to various factors such as continuation of remote working culture, higher adoption of emerging technologies etc. The Dell Technologies 2021 Global Data Protection Index corroborates this, and highlights how organizations globally are managing more than 10 times the amount of data, as compared to five years ago”, said Ripu Bajwa, director & general manager, Data Protection Solutions, Dell Technologies India. “We understand these challenging times and the hurdles businesses are experiencing in securing data. Hence, to address the evolving IT and security demands of our customers, we are offering industry’s most comprehensive solutions for cyber resiliency, at the edge, the core and the cloud environments. We are constantly working with our customers to understand their security challenges, and are offering them the required data security solutions to reduce business risk and ensure flawless business continuity.”

“Our newly launched Dell Technologies 2021 GDPI findings indicate that over two-thirds of the respondents from Asia Pacific and Japan are concerned that their organizations’ existing data protection measures may not be sufficient to cope with malware and ransomware threats,” said Lucas Salter, general manager, Data Protection Solutions, Dell Technologies, Asia Pacific & Japan. “In this age of increasing cyber threats, we understand that the stakes have never been higher and protecting data has never been more complex. We have been working with our customers across the region to address this growing challenge by adopting a holistic cybersecurity and data protection strategy to reduce risk and ensure resilience in the event of a ransomware or other cyberattack.”

New GDPI findings reveal an increased state of complexity around data protection

The 2021 Dell Technologies GDPI survey of 1,000 global IT decision makers of which 250 are from APJ (Australia, India, Japan, Singapore, and South Korea) shows organizations are combatting continued data growth and increased data protection complexities. The study found that globally organizations are managing more than 10 times the amount of data than they did five years ago – from 1.45 petabytes in 2016 to 14.6 petabytes in 2021. Additionally, 68%  of respondents in India (Global: 82%, APJ: 82%) are concerned their organization’s existing data protection solutions won’t be able to meet all future business challenges. These concerns are well-founded, with 26% (Global: 33%, APJ: 38%) reporting data loss in the last year and 34% (Global: 45 %, APJ: 42%), experiencing unplanned system downtime.

GDPI findings include:

• 66% of respondents in India (Global: 62%, APJ: 68%) are concerned their existing data protection measures may not be sufficient to cope with malware and ransomware threats, while 74% (Global: 74%, APJ: 72%) agree they have increased exposure to data loss from cyber threats with the growth of employees working from home.
• 42% of respondents in India (Global: 67%, APJ: 67%), lack confidence that all their business-critical data can be recovered in the event of a destructive cyberattack or data loss.
• 70% of respondents in India (Global: 63%, APJ: 64%) believe emerging technologies—such as cloud-native applications, Kubernetes containers, artificial intelligence and machine learning pose a risk to data protection, and the lack of data protection solutions for newer technologies was one of the top three data protection challenges for organizations.
• On average, globally, the cost of data loss in the last 12 months is approaching four times higher for organizations using multiple data protection vendors as compared to those using a single-vendor approach.

Delivering comprehensive data protection and trusted cyber resiliency

Dell Technologies is addressing the ever-evolving IT landscape with solutions that help organizations protect traditional and modern workloads with a singular approach. A leader in multi-cloud data protection, Dell protects about seven exabytes of data across all major public cloud providers.ⁱⁱ Through constant innovation, agile engineering and tight integration with VMware and other industry leaders, Dell continues to be the leading provider of data protection appliances and software globally.ⁱⁱⁱ Dell offers one of the industry’s most comprehensive portfolios for cyber resilience at the edge, core data centers and multi-cloud environments, delivered with solutions such as Dell EMC PowerProtect Cyber Recovery and Dell EMC PowerScale with Superna Eyeglass Ransomware Defender.

New software and managed services offerings include:

• Dell EMC PowerProtect Data Manager adds Transparent Snapshots to give organizations a new and unique way to help protect their VMware VMs at scale. By simplifying and automating VM image-level backups and requiring less infrastructure, Transparent Snapshots deliver up to five times faster backups and up to a five-time reduction in VM latency ^iv, helping organizations ensure availability of VM data effectively and efficiently.
• Dell EMC PowerProtect appliances with Smart Scale helps organizations manage multiple data protection appliances at exabyte scale, allowing IT staff to make informed decisions about their capacity needs and keep up with data growth. With Smart Scale, customers can configure multiple appliances as a single pool giving them the ability to see and manage large data sets in one entity—as many as 32 PowerProtect appliances and more than three exabytes of logical capacity. Organizations can maximize resources and save costs with proactive monitoring and simplified management of backup data.
• Dell Technologies Managed Services for Cyber Recovery Solution helps organizations drive consistent operations and reduce risk of data loss by having Dell experts manage day-to-day cyber recovery vault operations and support recovery activities. These managed services build on Dell's portfolio of cyber recovery consulting, deployment, and support services, helping customers protect and manage this critical capability.

Tian Beng Ng, senior vice president and general manager, Channel, Dell Technologies, Asia Pacific and Japan said, “Hybrid work arrangements bring with it new threats that make effective cybersecurity practices a challenge for businesses of all sizes. Successful security transformation is based on working in collaboration with a wider ecosystem — from partnering with vendors in providing the best-in-class solutions to enhancing cyber resilience with their local know-how. Our channel partners play a vital role in how we drive new innovations that we bring to market, and new offerings such as Transparent Snapshots and Smart Scale will offer organizations greater speed and agility in the race to protect their virtual infrastructure.”

“The demand for security has gone up, and rightfully so. After all, nearly 1.16 million cases of cyberattacks were reported in 2020, which is almost three times from 2019. On an average, 3,137 cyber security-related issues were reported every day during that year. This is because lot of hackers used the panic caused by Covid-19 to come up with new ways of attacks which continue to date, touching upon sensitive issues like vaccine campaigns and remote work. With the help of new technologies like AI and ML, these new ways can be spotted quickly and stopped before it’s too late”, said Shikhil Sharma, Security Researcher. “With hackers becoming more and more interested in the data of Indian consumers, security audits, firewall, cyber- vault and malware scanners are some ways by which businesses can securely operate and stay safe from these rising cyber-attacks.”