Dell Technologies Inc. is bringing its anti-ransomware service to Amazon Web Services Inc.’s public cloud platform.

It announced today the availability of a new offering, Dell EMC PowerProtect Cyber Recovery for AWS, giving AWS users an easy way to buy and deploy an air-gapped cybervault to isolate and protect their most critical data from ransomware attacks.

Ransomware refers to malware that relies on encryption technologies to lock up company data and demand a ransom be paid to unlock it. It’s becoming increasingly ubiquitous among enterprises. According to recent survey data from International Data Corp., in the last 12 months more than a third of organizations worldwide have fallen victim to a ransomware attack or other data breach that blocked access to critical data or systems.

The challenge companies face in securing themselves from these is complicated massively by increased data sprawl. Findings from Dell’s 2021 Global Data Protection Index show the average organization is managing 10 times the amount of data it did five years ago, up from 1.45 petabytes in 2016 to 14.6 petabytes today.

Companies appreciate the scale of the problem too, with the same survey finding that 64% of organizations that use public cloud or hybrid cloud architectures admit they lack confidence in their ability to protect data across those environments.

Dell reckons it has the tonic to allay those fears. With Dell EMC PowerProtect Cyber Recovery for AWS, the company said, customers will benefit from multiple layers of protection that allow them to resume business operations rapidly after suffering a ransomware attack. The service works by moving critical data away from the attack surface, physically and logically isolating it through a secure, automated operational air gap.

Unlike other backup services, Dell said this air gap also locks down management interfaces and requires separate security credentials and multifactor authentication for access.

“It’s creating an extra offline, air-gapped copy of the most critical applications that’s not going to be susceptible to the attack,” Jim Shook, director of the cybersecurity and compliance practice at Dell, said last year in an interview on theCUBE, SiliconANGLE’s mobile livestreaming studio. “With Cyber Recovery what we’re doing is creating a vaulted environment that’s offline. They can’t get there from where they are so they can’t get access to that data.”

One early adopter, The Commonwealth Bank of Australia, has already given the new service the thumbs up, saying that since adopting the platform it is confident its cloud operations always remain safe, sound and secure.

“Using powerful cloud cyber recovery solutions gives us the confidence that our data remains protected from highly destructive cyberthreats, like ransomware, and overall uplifts our risk resilience and operational efficiency,” said Jason Sandery, executive manager of cloud services at Commonwealth Bank of Australia.

Holger Mueller of Constellation Research Inc. said data backup services are moving to the cloud, just as every other kind of workload is, and that it’s good to see Dell, as one of the industry’s most trusted vendors, getting involved in that.

“Because this is a cloud offering everything needs to be encrypted and protected with access controls to ensure the data is safe, and Dell is doing that,” Mueller said. “It’s good to see Dell participating in the hybrid cloud market opportunity.”

Dell EMC PowerProtect Cyber Recovery for AWS is available in the AWS Marketplace starting today.

Dell’s Shook provides a more detailed look at how Dell EMC PowerProtect Cyber Recovery works in this video:

Photo: Fotoblend/Pixabay