For MSP clients, sleep-destroying cybercrime headlines tend to come in two forms—breaches that expose sensitive information and might expose them to litigation. Ransomware strikes fear in the hearts of business owners and managers everywhere because of its ability to instantly bring operations to a halt—is a problem tailor-made for a cyber-resilience posture toward cyber defense efforts.
The Rise Of “Ransomware-as-a-Service”
Ransomware attacks have been on the rise for years. Why? Because they’re successful. In fact, it’s such a lucrative enterprise that bad guys with no hacking skills at all can get in on the action with Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS). Organized hackers have deployed RaaS to extend their reach, empowering unsophisticated criminals to get into the game (splitting the proceeds with them) and deploying many more attacks than they could manage on their own.
The proliferation of ransomware attacks impacts companies of all sizes, including small and medium-sized businesses. Let’s set aside significant events like the Colonial Pipeline attack. A simple Google search will yield stories about ransomware victims from every sector, including manufacturing, finance, healthcare (hospitals have been hit particularly hard), education, public sector and even other technology service providers.
Backup Tapped As Protection Against Ransomware
It stands to reason that data backup solutions were tapped for defense when the ransomware threat emerged. The backup approach makes sense; if your data’s been locked up and held for ransom, having a mirror of that data takes power away from attackers. However, even this seemingly sound strategy quickly proved problematic in many cases for the following reasons:
- Attackers learned to target backup data, especially when facilitated by unencrypted backup routines.
- Companies failed to backup consistently across the organization—department, app, user and endpoint—rendering backup ineffective protection.
Disaster Recovery-as-a-Service Emerges As Best-in-Class Ransomware Defense
Against this backdrop of compromised backup files and backup challenges, Disaster Recovery-as-a-Service (DRaaS) has emerged as a go-to solution for reliable ransomware protection. That’s because the right DRaaS solution:
- Automates backups and doesn’t disrupt operations
- Continuously syncs vital data
- Delivers ultra-fast recovery
Discussing DRaaS With Your Clients
There’s a good chance that your clients are backing up data at some level. Almost all organizations do. But few are backing it up everywhere they need to, and almost none are doing it often enough. The good news here is that most of them either know they aren’t backing up enough or will grasp the shortcomings in their routines when you guide them through a simple, three-question discovery:
1. “How often are you backing up vital databases, and are you getting all of them?”
2. “Are you backing up application data?”
3. “Are you backing up user data?”
This simple review empowers you to engage your clients in a discussion about the reality that DRaaS, which once was a solution associated with natural disasters like hurricanes, fires, floods, mudslides, tornadoes and the like, now serves as a primary shield against ransomware.
The best part? They still get protection from all of those events, too. You just need to set them up with a DRaaS solution that delivers the backup frequency and reliability they need without disrupting their operations.