How can immutable snapshots be used in the public sector against NAS storage ransomware attacks?

While ransomware is accelerating, expenditures in the public sector on infrastructure modernization hasn’t kept their pace. As a result, local and state government institutions are targets of cybercriminals who hijack information essential to deliver services across local and state agencies such as schools, airports, hospitals and much more.

Many agencies use outdated equipment, software, and systems that are susceptible to today’s constant threat. In addition, data generates and share from distant locations, making it more vulnerable to a possible ransomware attack.

Therefore, it’s no wonder that a majority of the security officials have rated ransomware as a top security concern.

In this article, we will see how the public sector can benefit from immutable snapshots in their enterprise NAS storage infrastructure if ransomware takes over.

Using immutable snapshots for ransomware recovery

The immutable snapshot feature in a scale-out enterprise NAS storage is found in the best NAS systems that utilize to retrieve information in the event of ransomware. We will see how immutable snapshots can help the public sector to increase its data security against ransomware.

Stop Data Alteration and Deletion

Snapshots are immutable and cannot be changed, erased, or overwritten, which means they can protect your data from ransomware attacks. Snapshots backed up or replicated to a different location can also help restore volumes before a ransomware event. However, complete restoration isn’t guaranteed because the immutable snapshot feature cannot talk to the hardware, unlike full backup appliances.

Secure Data Continuously

Immutable snapshots are read-only metadata versions for your files. They offer point-in-time data recovery. Thus, in the situation of downtime, disaster or ransomware attacks, the snapshots can restore to an earlier data state. Remember, though, that since it is only point in time data, it may fail to recover. Especially if there are inconsistencies between the hardware and software level interaction during state changes. That is because, unlike full-fledged backup systems, the immutable snapshot cannot speak to the hardware. It cannot know how data was being processed and utilized by a particular machine at a specific instance.

Restore Data Quickly

Immutable snapshots can rapidly generate recovery points for data at a rate of every 60 seconds, and data restoration can be restored in just seconds. In addition, they can restore the volume to its last working state and restore particular files to an earlier time point at lightning-fast speeds.

Bottom Line

In the critical area of data storage, snapshots have been around for a long time. They allow you to restore files to a previous point in time.

With immutable snapshots, you can reduce the risk of data loss by quickly restoring the system to a working state with the latest data without restoring all your data from backups.

If you are interested in Network Attached Storage appliances with immutable snapshots, we recommend checking out StoneFly. They provide other valuable features like deduplication, replication and AES encryption which increases your NAS storage data security manifolds.

So, what are you waiting for, get a NAS solution or even a SAN solution from StoneFly today and enjoy the many benefits.