Data Protection

Get a quick insight on what my ESG colleagues and I took away as our first impressions from EMC World last week, in easy-to-consume video format.

This ESG Lab review documents hands-on testing of the ExaGrid backup appliance using Veeam Backup & Replication software, and demonstrates the ability to execute Veeam Instant VM Recovery alongside ExaGrid’s capacity- and cost-saving deduplication.

SMB organizations are just as reliant as their enterprise and midmarket counterparts on data to support day-to-day operations, though they typically lack the resources and/or IT expertise to ensure its availability and preservation. In spite of this, recent ESG research reveals that many SMBs understand the importance of their IT assets and are at least attempting to back up their data, whether proactively or reactively.  However, given the fact that even larger organizations haven’t “solved” data protection, there is an opportunity in the SMB space for both education and services to not only supplement current backup strategies, but–more importantly–to foster new ones.

This month, I took a look at the differences between ‘Regulatory Compliance’ and ‘Operational Readiness’ (HA/BC/DR) through a series of videos.  This week (4 of 4), we’re taking a closer look at the regulations that apply to government agencies and contractors (CO-OP).  Each week, we looked at some regulatory mandates and try to glean some pragmatic IT ideas for data protection from them.  I hope that you enjoyed the videos.

This month, I am taking a look at the differences between ‘Regulatory Compliance’ and ‘Operational Readiness’ (HA/BC/DR) through a series of videos.  This week (3 of 4), we’re taking a closer look at the regulations that apply to healthcare organizations (HIPAA).  Each week, I’ll take a look at some regulatory mandates and try to glean some pragmatic IT ideas for data protection from them.  I hope that you enjoy the videos.

This month, I am taking a look at the differences between ‘Regulatory Compliance’ and ‘Operational Readiness’ (HA/BC/DR) through a series of videos.  This week (2 of 4), we’re taking a closer look at the regulations that apply to publicly-held companies (SOX) and financial institutions (SEC).  Each week, I’ll take a look at some regulatory mandates and try to glean some pragmatic IT ideas for data protection from them.  I hope that you enjoy the videos.

I talk about the need for both disciplines - archiving and backup - as separate, but complementary tasks in this video blog.

This month, I am taking a look at the differences between ‘Regulatory Compliance’ and ‘Operational Readiness’ (HA/BC/DR) through a series of videos.  For the next four Tuesdays, I’ll take a look at some regulatory mandates and try to glean some pragmatic IT ideas for data protection from them.  I hope that you enjoy the videos.

Evaluating the Out-of-the-Box Experience

This ESG Lab Validation report documents hands-on testing of the Symantec Backup Exec 3600 Appliance, which offers advanced data protection for virtual and physical environments. The report focuses on the out-of-the-box experience, ease of management, and cost-effectiveness.

Achieving Best Practices for Virtual Machine Backup and Recovery

This ESG Lab Validation report documents hands-on testing of Symantec Backup Exec 2012’s advanced virtual server data protection. The report focuses on how Backup Exec 2012 measures up against best practices in virtual data protection.

In a world congested with virtualized-data protection options including “free versus fee,” free often wins, at least in the beginning. When you outgrow the free edition, you can sometimes pay a license fee and access a more robust version later. However, trumping even “free” is the combination of “free plus built in,” for example, VMware VDP. Now, VMware is releasing an up-scaled version—VDP Advanced (VDPA).

In spite of marginal progress, privileged accounts remain vulnerable. Why? Sophisticated cyber attacks like APTs take advantage of informal processes, weak security controls, and monitoring limitations to target administrator accounts, compromise their systems, and gain access to valuable IT assets. Tactical changes don’t go far enough. Rather, CISOs need to think in terms of a privileged account security architecture offering central control, management, monitoring, and oversight of privileged accounts for IT assets throughout the enterprise.

Last week, I had the opportunity to sit down with Tom Hughes and Todd Watson from IBM. We talked about three IT trends that are disrupting traditional data protection strategies and legacy approaches:

Highly Virtualized / Private Cloud Infrastructures

Cloud-based Solutions for backup & storage

Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) for endpoint protection

This ESG Lab report documents hands-on testing of Veeam Backup & Replication, designed to assess Veeam’s claims that they deliver a Powerful, Easy-to-Use, and Affordable data protection solution Built for Virtualization.

This ESG Lab Review documents hands-on testing of Druva inSync Cloud, an endpoint backup solution with a focus on ease of deployment and use, near-continuous data protection, access and restore, and data deduplication in a mixed Windows and Mac environment.

Fast, Simple, and Agentless Deduplicated Virtual Machine Backup and Recovery

This report documents hands-on testing of VMware vSphere Data Protection (VDP) with a focus on the operational benefits of the simple and manageable data protection offered within the VMware management infrastructure, as well as the cost and capacity efficiency of the solution's integrated deduplication technology.