Organisations facing data protection challenges: Dell

The Dell Technologies 2021 Global Data Protection Index (GDPI) findings have revealed that organisations are facing several data protection challenges driven by the constant threat of ransomware and the consumption of emerging technologies such as cloud-native applications, Kubernetes containers and artificial intelligence.

According to a recent IDC survey, more than one-third of organisations worldwide have experienced a ransomware attack or breach that blocked access to systems or data in the previous 12 months.

“As we move further in the data era, the amount of data being generated will continue to increase due to various factors such as continuation of remote working culture, higher adoption of emerging technologies etc. The Dell Technologies 2021 Global Data Protection Index corroborates this, and highlights how organisations globally are managing more than 10 times the amount of data, as compared to five years ago”, said Ripu Bajwa, Director and General Manager, Data Protection Solutions, Dell Technologies India.

“We understand these challenging times and the hurdles businesses are experiencing in securing data. Hence, to address the evolving IT and security demands of our customers, we are offering industry’s most comprehensive solutions for cyber resiliency, at the edge, the core and the cloud environments. We are constantly working with our customers to understand their security challenges, and are offering them the required data security solutions to reduce business risk and ensure flawless business continuity,” he added.

“Our newly launched Dell Technologies 2021 GDPI findings indicate that over two-thirds of the respondents from Asia Pacific and Japan are concerned that their organisations’ existing data protection measures may not be sufficient to cope with malware and ransomware threats,” said Lucas Salter, General Manager, Data Protection Solutions, Dell Technologies, Asia Pacific and Japan.

“In this age of increasing cyber threats, we understand that the stakes have never been higher and protecting data has never been more complex. We have been working with our customers across the region to address this growing challenge by adopting a holistic cybersecurity and data protection strategy to reduce risk and ensure resilience in the event of a ransomware or other cyberattack," he added.

New GDPI findings reveal increased state of complexity around data protection.

The 2021 Dell Technologies GDPI survey of 1,000 global IT decision makers of which 250 are from APJ (Australia, India, Japan, Singapore, and South Korea) shows organisations are combatting continued data growth and increased data protection complexities.

The study found that globally organisations are managing more than 10 times the amount of data than they did five years ago – from 1.45 petabytes in 2016 to 14.6 petabytes in 2021.

Additionally, 68 per cent of respondents in India (Global: 82 per cent, APJ: 82 per cent) are concerned their organisation’s existing data protection solutions won’t be able to meet all future business challenges. These concerns are well-founded, with 26 per cent (Global: 33 per cent, APJ: 38 per cent) reporting data loss in the last year and 34 per cent (Global: 45 per cent, APJ: 42 per cent), experiencing unplanned system downtime.

GDPI findings include:

Around 66 per cent of respondents in India (Global: 62 per cent, APJ: 68 per cent) are concerned their existing data protection measures may not be sufficient to cope with malware and ransomware threats, while 74 per cent (Global: 74 per cent, APJ: 72 per cent) agree they have increased exposure to data loss from cyber threats with the growth of employees working from home.

Around 42 per cent of respondents in India (Global: 67 per cent, APJ: 67 per cent), lack confidence that all their business-critical data can be recovered in the event of a destructive cyberattack or data loss.

Around 70 per cent of respondents in India (Global: 63 per cent, APJ: 64 per cent) believe emerging technologies — such as cloud-native applications, Kubernetes containers, artificial intelligence and machine learning pose a risk to data protection, and the lack of data protection solutions for newer technologies was one of the top three data protection challenges for organisations.

On average, globally, the cost of data loss in the last 12 months is approaching four times higher for organisations using multiple data protection vendors as compared to those using a single-vendor approach.