When a big business falls victim to a ransomware attack, we see it in the news. This gives a false impression that smaller organizations are somehow protected because they’re too small for hackers to care about. After all, why rob someone on the street when you can rob a bank that has so much more money? The reality, however, is that over 85% of ransomware attacks target smaller firms. Let that sink in. You’re not safe because you’re small.
Larger firms have been working hard at fortifying defenses, implementing complex recovery tools and many have significantly improved their position with modern practices around backup and DR. Look at this from the perspective of the hacker; what is an easier day’s work? Attacking a small firm that has fewer pathways to recovery and will probably have to pay the ransom, or trying to hunt down a white whale (Fortune 1000 company) that has deep pockets but also more defenses? Most hackers know where the easy money is.
If you’re a small organization, the threat of downtime extends beyond just ransomware. Server failure, accidental data deletion, software failure or major disasters are just as much of a threat to you as they are to any larger firm, maybe even more so. How many smaller organizations have redundant hardware or secondary data centers they can failover to? How many have a staff of IT professionals who can mitigate a problem rapidly? Most small firms have 1-2 IT staff who are running around like crazy trying to get everything done. It’s no wonder there are so many gaps when it comes to proper backup and data protection—what IT person has the time to do it all perfectly?
The good news is that the market is starting to have an answer for companies that don’t have unlimited budgets or hordes of IT staff.
Small organizations need three important things:
1) A complete backup and DR solution. Most companies have a backup solution today, but it lacks a true DR component. What they need is to have something that if everything goes sideways for them, they can fully fail over to a secondary cloud location and keep their business running.
2) A solution that is easy to implement and operate. Large firms have teams that can be devoted to watching backups and setting up DR plays. Small firms have no such luxury. They need something that doesn’t take endless hours to install and maintain.
3) Quality onboarding and trustworthy ongoing support. Small firms have very capable IT staff but like any new tech, they will need some help orienting to how it works and how to properly implement and use the solution.
FirstLight has been providing leading backup and DR solutions for more than a decade. What makes us unique is that we choose best-of-breed software partners and pair it together with our fiber network, data centers and cloud services—all underpinned by a strong focus on putting customers first.
We help companies big and small achieve the common goal of not having to live in fear of downtime or data loss. If this sounds like something you’re interested in, we’d love to speak with you about how we can help.
