Logicalis US Unveils the Secret to Protecting Digital Assets
Solution Provider Examines the CIA Approach
NEW YORK, June 16, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- With recent data breaches making headlines worldwide, CIOs everywhere are concerned about the security of their companies' digital assets – and whether or not their organizations will recover if their data is stolen, lost or damaged. According to Logicalis US, an international IT solutions and managed services provider (www.us.logicalis.com), IT pros should assume their data is at risk and plan accordingly.
"The scariest thing about data loss isn't what you do know. It's what you don't know," says Bill Mansfield, Solution Architect, Data Protection and Availability, Logicalis US. "You never know what kind of attacks might come in, so you can't rigorously plan for them or entirely protect against them, and that means your data is vulnerable. Today's IT professionals have to take proactive steps to ensure the confidentiality, integrity and availability – the C-I-A – of their data. Oftentimes that means coupling sophisticated enterprise backup solutions like HP's Data Protector, for example, with either their own dedicated team of internal storage professionals or with a managed services provider that can monitor and manage both the software and the entire business continuity/disaster recovery process for them 24/7."
Mansfield says there are two key principles to master when it comes to protecting digital assets: First, keep the bad guys out. And second, bad guys are infinitely ingenious, so assume they will get in, then create – and maintain – an environment that allows you to recover when they do.
CIA Protection for Your Digital Assets
Protecting a company's digital assets requires focusing on three important areas: confidentiality, integrity and availability – the CIA approach.
- Confidentiality: The confidentiality focus protects data from unauthorized users both physically and digitally. Start by keeping digital assets from leaving the company's hands with a layer of physical security that encircles the data center including everything from locks on data center doors to secure passwords on storage arrays. Next, encrypt the data so that, if it does fall into the wrong hands, it will be useless to them. Be sure to encrypt both data at rest (like that stored in disk subsystems) as well as in motion (like tape that leaves the data center for off-site storage).
- Integrity: The integrity focus protects against authorized users who make a mistake or applications that fail and lead to data loss. In this phase, the IT pro's job is to use backup, snapshots and replication to create recovery points and a forensic view of the environment. This will enable the company's storage administrator to rewind to a time when the data was good and start fresh from there.
- Availability: The availability focus refers to ensuring uptime and access to data when it's needed most. When designing a storage solution, it's crucial to match storage systems to the availability needs of the organization. Equally important, the storage must be managed 24x7x365 whether that management is done by on-site personnel or remotely by a solution provider partner. IT will also need to decide whether or not off-site data replication is necessary to give the organization the ability to withstand a large-scale disaster; in this instance, disaster recovery-as-a-service may be a cost-effective option to consider.
Want to Learn More?
- Is there a smarter way to manage storage? Explore three reasons CIOs are embracing new storage technologies here: http://ow.ly/O3of2.
- When Clarke Power's server and storage infrastructures shut down, Logicalis and HP responded quickly to help bring company systems back online: http://ow.ly/O3nFl.
- Not all disaster recovery partners are equal; learn what makes some DRaaS providers stand out from the crowd in this educational video: http://ow.ly/O6qBp.
About Logicalis
Logicalis is an international IT solutions and managed services provider with a breadth of knowledge and expertise in communications and collaboration, data center and cloud services, and managed services.
Logicalis employs over 4,000 people worldwide, including highly trained service specialists who design, specify, deploy and manage complex IT infrastructures to meet the needs of almost 6,000 corporate and public sector customers. To achieve this, Logicalis maintains strong partnerships with technology leaders such as Cisco, HP, IBM, EMC, NetApp, Microsoft, VMware and ServiceNow on an international basis and has specialized solutions for enterprise and medium-sized companies in vertical markets covering financial services, telecommunications, media and technology, education, healthcare, retail, government, manufacturing and professional services helping customers benefit from cutting-edge technologies in a cost-effective way.
The Logicalis Group has annualized revenues of over $1.5 billion from operations in Europe, North America, Latin America and Asia Pacific and is one of the leading IT and communications solution integrators specializing in the areas of advanced technologies and services.
The Logicalis Group is a division of Datatec Limited, listed on the Johannesburg and London AIM Stock Exchanges, with revenues of approximately $6 billion.
For more information, visit www.us.logicalis.com.
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Media contacts:
Lisa Dreher, VP, Marketing & Business Development,
Logicalis US
[email protected]
425-201-8111
www.us.logicalis.com
Karen Franse, Communication Strategy Group for Logicalis US
[email protected]
866-997-2424
www.gocsg.com
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SOURCE Logicalis US
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