The Ultimate Guide to TECA’s Enhanced Data Security

In part one of this two part series, John McGee, Senior Director of Technology at TECA Data Safe, outlined the variety of steps, policies, and processes TECA regularly employs to ensure the highest level of security for all their clients.

This month, John answers our questions regarding additional supreme services TECA offers to clients who wish to enhance their data security even further.

• What is multifactor authentication and what type of organization would benefit from it?
• Most people are familiar with providing a username and password to prove who they are. A username is something commonly known, like an email address or first initial and last name. In this case, the password is the single factor used to authenticate an identity.
  A good password should be secret, hard to guess, and known only to the user associated with the identity. Unfortunately, passwords can be shared or easily leaked. Because they should be difficult to remember, people often write them down where they can be easily accessed, or they keep them in a file that can be stolen or compromised. Passwords are often reused, meaning people use the same password for multiple accounts. If just one of those accounts is compromised, an attacker can expose a person’s password and use it against other accounts, often with great success.
  Multifactor authentication adds a layer of security to the authentication process by requiring a second type of credential to authenticate.
  Credentials are commonly broken into three categories: something you know, something you have, and something you are. A password is “something you know,” but this is the weakest credential for the reasons mentioned above.
  The “something you have” category might take the form of a smart card, an authenticator app, or a secret code sent to your phone.
  The “something you are” category typically refers to biometrics, such as a fingerprint reader, retina scanner, or face scan.
  Using two or more factors to authenticate dramatically improves account security. For example, if a person’s password were stolen, and that person uses multifactor authentication, the password is not enough to access the account without that second form of authentication, such as a code sent to that person’s phone.
  It is possible that a hacker can steal your password, but it is significantly less likely that a hacker can steal your password and also have access to your phone. A hacker is even less likely to have your password and fingerprint.
  All organizations can benefit from multifactor authentication. Multifactor authentication reduces data leaks and improves account security. Some form of multifactor authentication is required for organizations governed by HIPAA, PCI-DSS, or other information security standards.
  Multifactor authentication has moved beyond enterprise and into the general public. Many online sites, such as banking, email, and shopping, require or at least recommend enabling multifactor authentication to access the services they provide.
  The good thing about multifactor authentication apps is that the same application can be used for business and personal security.
• How do backup replications to the TECA infrastructure offer clients greater security?
• An offsite backup is a copy of business data stored in a geographically different region separate from the source data. Offsite backups protect an organization’s data from natural and human-made disasters, cyberattacks, and human error.
  Suppose an organization’s data is compromised or inaccessible due to a natural disaster, such as a hurricane, fire, or earthquake. In that case, the offsite backup is not impacted, and the customer can retrieve or recover their data.
  Likewise, suppose the organization’s production systems are compromised due to a cyberattack, such as ransomware. In that case, the offsite backups are “air-gapped” and not accessible to the bad actor who compromised the source data.
  TECA Data Safe offers various offsite backup solutions, depending on the client’s needs, infrastructure, and budget.
  In addition to storing backups offsite, TECA Data Safe can provide the infrastructure required to quickly get the organization up and running offsite in one of our data centers.
• What are air-gapped backups and when should they be used?
• Air-gapping is a strategy by which essential business data is kept isolated offline, often at a remote location, to ensure the copy of business data cannot be compromised by an event impacting the source data.
  Recent ransomware attacks have not only compromised business data, but have searched for and destroyed backups in their various forms.
  An air-gapped backup can be as simple as a backup to tape that is subsequently removed from the tape drive and stored on a shelf. However, that tape is subject to theft, destruction, or regional disaster.
  Shipping that tape to an offsite location decreases the likelihood that an event at the source location will affect the backup. However, there is usually a delay between when the backup is completed and when the tape is moved offsite.
  The customer can experience a delay when retrieving the backup data as well. TECA Data Safe offers various offsite backup solutions that utilize the customer’s Internet connection, so backups are moved offsite (air-gapped) sooner.
  In addition, backups can be retrieved on demand. TECA Data Safe offers many offsite air-gapped backup solutions, such as Veeam CloudConnect, Virtual Tape Library replication, and storage replication, depending on the customer’s infrastructure and requirements.
• What type of organizations should utilize redundant and highly available systems throughout and why?
• Any organization that values data availability should utilize redundant, highly available systems. High availability is a concept that involves eliminating downtime and single points of failure.
  Most businesses rely on their systems to provide services to their customers and generate revenue. When those systems are unavailable, the business is affected in many ways, including loss of revenue and damage to the company’s reputation.
  High availability is achieved in various ways, including scaling up and down, deploying redundant components, load balancing, and automating and offloading backups to an offsite location.

Questions about TECA’s secure data centers or the services we provide? The expert TECA technology team are happy to help. Contact us today.

The latest trend for cybercriminals? Ransomware as a Service (RaaS). Utilizing an MLM business model, developers lease out their ransomware tools to wanna-be cybercriminals, allowing them to go after large enterprise networks. Once the attacker receives the ransom, they pass on a percentage to the original developer.

Learn more about the surge in ransomware attacks, what to do to protect your organization, and how TECA Data Safe can help.

True or False?

Are you up on your tech trivia? Find out now.