The recent passing of Federal Data and Transparency laws designed to increase the sharing of important citizen data amongst government departments is the latest evidence that information and data privacy is vital to building national prosperity.

The passing of the Data Availability and Transparency Act into law should also come as a warning that more than ever, data is gold – and as has forever been the case, gold attracts thieves. Therefore, it’s vital that organisations, from the largest public sector departments to local governments, take the appropriate steps to elevate their business and technology environment in a riskier world.

As more organisations, from hospitals to banks, retailers to infrastructure providers, share more data - regardless of the laws they do it under - they need to do so in a way that makes backup and recovery simple, enhances security, improves productivity, and makes data more productive. 

Are Australian organisations ready?

For many, the honest answer will be a ‘no’. Recent research from Cohesity and Forrester, which included Australian respondents, revealed that only 11% of organisations can recover some of their data within 72 hours of an attack. Given Cybersecurity Ventures predicts a ransomware attack will occur somewhere in the world every two seconds by 2031, up from every 11 seconds or less today, and ransomware attacks on Australian businesses have increased from 45% in 2020 to over 80% in 2021 (Sophos’s State of Ransomware 2022 report), ignoring data management and protection is simply risks not disrupted operations and public embarrassment, but hits to revenue and potential the incursion of financial penalties if customer data is stolen.

What do best practice data management and protection look like in 2022?

As with any technology, data management technology has evolved in capability and breadth. Many organisations are still relying on legacy data management technology that was developed in previous decades or even the last century, and small improvements or investments into data management solutions along the way do not mean an organisation’s data management capabilities support the IT operational tasks or answer the cyberthreat challenges of today. This is why embracing a next-gen approach or next-gen data management platform is vital to simplify data management and governance, enhance security postures, make data recoverable, and extract more value from data.

Previously, effective data management meant having a backup copy of data that could be called on as an insurance policy if it was ever needed. That’s no longer the case. Today, not only is stored production data frequently encrypted by bad actors engaging in ransomware attacks but conventional backups are often destroyed at the same time. In addition, organisations need to meet basic data availability and access requirements, comply with government regulations, optimize storage costs, and/or analyse data for key business insights. As a result, relying on outdated data management systems is not just an IT problem - it poses a serious threat to business continuity and success. 

Next-gen data management offers a combination of four elements to put companies in the driver’s seat with their data: zero-trust security principles, AI-powered insights, large scale simplicity, and third-party extensibility. This approach can help organisations ensure their data is backed up and protected. It can also play a key role in reducing data infrastructure silos which can help save money, increase productivity, and reduce a company’s attack surface, which is critical when trying to protect data from ransomware and other cyber threats.

With next-gen data management, companies can also easily bring apps to the data, simplifying how organizations extract value from their data. The good news is next-gen data management solutions are already available today and are being used by numerous notable organisations throughout the world

2022 – don’t waste the opportunity

Australia’s regulators are watching, with the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC), noting in its latest half-yearly Notifiable Data Report that organisations must take a proactive approach to demonstrate “...effective privacy management.” As data continues to grow exponentially, while budgets stagnate or even shrink, and the pressure to drive business value rises, a new way of looking at data management is crucial.  Small improvements to legacy backup and storage technology simply won't be enough. Instead, it’s critical that companies embrace a next-gen approach that is designed to simplify data management, enhance security, and make data more productive in a dynamic hybrid cloud world. 

Now is the time to act, or companies risk missing out on not only the opportunity provided by progressive laws that encourage secure data sharing for creating new offerings, but losing customers and their trust, and potentially falling afoul of regulations and legislation.

So how can organisations revisit and rethink their data management environment and approach, given data is an organisation’s most important and vulnerable asset? Here are three points to consider:

1. Prepare for the worst-case scenario

Ransomware is ubiquitous, and as attacks become more sophisticated in nature, the problem is becoming more urgent and dire. With Cybersecurity Ventures expecting global cybercrime costs to grow by 15% per year over the next five years, reaching $10.5 trillion USD annually by 2025.

Beyond implementing defences like firewalls and two-factor authentication, companies need to invest in modern data management solutions that include capabilities like AI-powered anomaly detection that can help businesses identify threats, respond, and if necessary, remediate quickly. These advanced solutions can also help organisations restore data and quickly resume operations without disappointing their customers or paying ransom to hackers.

2. Be ready for the hybrid future of work

Many companies are now using cloud solutions or applications for everyday processes, with the pandemic resulting in greater global spending on public cloud services. According to Gartner, the sector has grown 23.1% to a total of $332.3 billion by 2021, up from $270 billion in 2020.

Many enterprises are embracing a hybrid-cloud model, and not just managing data on-premises, which also can include Data Management as a Service (DMaaS). With DMaaS, data and infrastructure are managed by a next-generation data management vendor and hosted by a leading cloud service provider. These services, which often include backup, disaster recovery and more, are designed to offer a host of benefits ranging from enhanced scalability and data security to added flexibility and efficiency. These SaaS offerings can also enable companies to shift from a CapEx to an OpEx model and empower already-overstretched IT teams to focus on other business-critical tasks. 

3. Benefit from more effective data management

CIOs and their colleagues in business departments continue to be inundated with data. With Frost & Sullivan revealing that spending on Big Data analytics will increase 4.5-fold by 2025. This demonstrates that companies are increasingly focused on getting the most out of their information and are collecting valuable data that needs to be looked after - which is why data management has never been more important.

Organisations should embrace next-gen solutions that enable analysis through analytics, that make it easy for data to be used for development and testing, and where businesses can easily bring third party apps to the data, which opens up a new world of possibilities -- including improving data compliance and security.