Bracing for the Data Security ‘Bang’
Data security is top-of-mind for businesses and consumers alike these days. According to the Gartner Hype Cycle for Data Security, 2021, “organizations are accelerating the deployment of sensitive data across multi-cloud architectures, which exposes data beyond traditional network boundaries. This is scaling up the exposure to data residency and privacy risks, and a growth in ransomware and data breaches.” The fact is that data is everywhere; it’s constantly growing at exponential rates and has become ripe for abuse and exploitation.
Discussions around security have been productive to a point, but the business landscape is still awash with insecure IT systems. While it’s good that the industry is finally shining a light on the importance of data within these systems, there is serious urgency to the data security problem. Cybercriminals are exploiting vulnerabilities and wreaking havoc on well-known companies that consumers use every day.
In their book, Left of Bang, the authors, Jason A. Riley and Patrick Van Horne, refer to something bad happening—for our purposes, say a security breach, ransomware or other network attack that causes damage to an environment, a service or data—as the “bang.” The authors refer to the moments prior to the bang, before something bad happens, as “left of the bang” and, once the bang occurs, you’re “right of the bang.”
The impact of a data security “bang” can be significantly lessened when an organization puts smart data security and management practices in place left of the bang versus what happens right of the bang if those practices are lacking.
The Data Security Bang
Imagine the inevitable has already happened—you’ve had a security breach—and you’re now dealing with the aftermath. You’re determining what vulnerability enabled the breach and the total damage as a result. You’re asking questions such as, “Is our data safe?”, “Are we functioning as a business?” and “Do we need to invoke our disaster recovery or our remediation plan to get back to business?” Organizations must act fast to ensure business returns to operations quickly while also figuring out how to prevent another incident in the future.
Are disaster recovery and remediation the same thing? It’s possible your remediation plan encompasses disaster recovery (DR), but the success of your DR plan depends on the failure scenario and severity.
While encryption can be a sufficient strategy for a ransomware attack, other scenarios may require further remediation. For example, as shift left development practices continue to gain popularity with IT organizations, rapid code changes to applications and workloads can introduce vulnerabilities that lead to equally bad outcomes.
Mitigating Impact Left of the Bang
The phrase “left of the bang” has been used a lot by security companies with respect to various computing environments—from virtualization to cloud and cloud-native—emphasizing the preventative measures that businesses should take to curb security breaches and cyberattacks. Such measures include shoring up your business’s security perimeter and ensuring you have visibility into all aspects of your business and data. This is the first line of defense toward achieving data security.
Detecting early warning signs and recognizing oncoming danger left of the bang can help prevent—or at least disrupt—an attack. This approach aligns with the shift left development practices that are gaining traction in the cloud-native space. Sound data management processes and strategies should also be in place to assist with remediation should a bang occur.
Unfortunately, most businesses will experience a security incident, but security vendors are continuously developing new solutions to ensure perimeters are more secure. Innovation in this space is moving extremely fast, helping to prevent attacks; however, it’s critical to plan for the worst by putting safeguards in place and codifying a solid plan to get business operations running as fast as possible in the wake of an incident.
Preparing for the Next Big Bang
It’s just a matter of time until a business is breached. That’s why data security, backup and recovery cannot be an afterthought. Implementing data management prevention strategies left of the bang must be a priority. This is particularly important as the use of containers and Kubernetes for software development is accelerating the pace of change and adoption of shift left DevOps practices. It also underscores the importance of shifting left the ways we automate and plan data management processes alongside application development and delivery. Having a solid backup and recovery plan in place will ensure organizations can recover data quickly and that it’s usable after the bang in a safe and secure manner.
