Cyber vault

What is a cyber vault?

Cyber vaults provide a comprehensive security solution to secure an organization's most sensitive and vital data. Its key benefits are:

• Integrity and availability of data
  - Continuous monitoring and audits assure data integrity and corruption-free storage.
  - In an isolated environment, regular backups provide speedy recovery from data loss, cyber attacks, or corruption, minimizing downtime.

• Regulations and compliance
  - Compliance with GDPR, HIPAA, SOX, and other regulations helps firms avoid penalties and maintain consumer confidence.
  - Audit trails, compliance reporting, and forensic analysis are simplified by comprehensive logging and auditing data access and alterations.

• Risk mitigation
  - Isolate essential data to prevent ransomware from encrypting or destroying valuable assets, allowing retrieval without paying a ransom.
  - Strict access controls and regular monitoring can reduce internal data breaches and protect against harmful insiders.

• Efficiency in operations
  - Cyber vaults centralize data management and security, simplifying administrative responsibilities.
  - Backup, encryption, and monitoring eliminate manual involvement and error.

• Increased confidence
  - Organizations can operate without worrying about data breaches since sensitive data is safeguarded and recoverable.

Cyber vaults are essential for current cybersecurity and data protection plans because they provide strong security, regulatory compliance, and fast recovery.

Cyber vault use cases

Cyber vaults protect companies against cyberattacks by securing storage, recovery, and compliance. Cyber vaults safeguard sensitive data, maintain company continuity, and fulfill regulations. The following use cases and examples demonstrate how cyber vaults are used.

• Ransomware protection and recovery: Cyber vaults provide safe, immutable backups for speedy ransomware recovery. Cyber vaults separate backups to prevent attackers from accessing or encrypting important data.
  Example: Financial institutions retain encrypted backups of vital financial documents in cyber vaults. The institution may recover its systems without paying the ransom, preserving business continuity and minimizing financial damages.

• Regulatory compliance: Healthcare and finance employ cyber vaults to comply with data protection laws. These vaults protect critical data from unauthorized access.
  Example: A healthcare provider stores patient records in a cyber vault to comply with HIPAA. The vault’s access restrictions and audit logs enable the supplier to fulfill strict data protection standards.

• Intellectual property protection: Cyber vaults safeguard valuable data and commercial secrets from cyber espionage and insider threats.
  Example: A tech business places its proprietary software source code and product designs in a cyber vault. This protects the company's competitive edge from unwanted access and leakage.
• Disaster recovery: Cyber vaults help firms swiftly retrieve essential data in the event of natural catastrophes, system failures, or cyber-attacks.
  Example: A manufacturing corporation backs up operational data in a cyber vault. The organization can promptly restore data from fire or flood-damaged data centers, minimizing downtime and productivity losses.
• Secure data sharing and collaboration: Global enterprises utilize cyber vaults to share sensitive data across various locations with stringent access restrictions and encryption.
  Example: A multinational firm shares private data between its locations globally via a cyber vault. The vault keeps data secure by restricting access to authorized users.
• Financial data protection: Cyber vaults protect transaction records, client data, and regulatory reports from cyberattacks and fraud in banks and financial organizations.
  Example: A cyber vault holds encrypted transaction and client data for a bank. Encryption and access restrictions keep the vault secure even in a cyberattack, assuring financial compliance.
• Legal and compliance data storage: Law firms and institutions secure sensitive legal papers and client data in cyber vaults.
  Example: A law firm stores case files, contracts, and client data in a cyber vault. The vault's safe storage and restricted access prevent secret legal data from manipulation.
• Research data security: Universities deploy cyber vaults to safeguard academic research, intellectual property, and scientific breakthroughs.
  Example: A pharmaceutical business maintains drug development research in a cyber vault. This keeps research data private from rivals.

Industry-specific use cases

• Banking services: Cyber vaults protect sensitive client data and transaction records in the banking sector. Vaults prevent fraud and unlawful access using safe backups, encryption, and rigorous access controls.
  Example: To protect client data, a bank stores encrypted customer accounts, transactions, and regulatory reports in a cyber vault. The vault provides speedy, data-free recovery from cyberattacks.
• Healthcare: As digital healthcare records grow, cyber vaults assist hospitals and healthcare providers safeguard EHRs and comply with HIPAA. These vaults protect patient privacy against illegal access and data breaches.
  Example: A hospital's cyber vault restricts access to patient medical records to authorized staff. It protects critical health data from cyberattacks and unintentional loss.
• Government: The government handles secret data, intelligence reports, and sensitive conversations that require the highest level of security. Cyber vaults, with airtight, secured storage, defend against cyber espionage and breaches.
  Example: A government agency stores sensitive information and conversations in a cyber vault. Advanced vault access control prevents data leaks and breaches by restricting access to authorized personnel.
• Education: Cyber vaults secure student records, research data, and intellectual property at universities and research institutes. These vaults safeguard data, prevent cyberattacks, and restrict academic and researcher access.
  Example: A university stores student academic and research data in a cyber vault. Only approved teachers and staff can access critical data in the vault, preventing cyberattacks and illegal changes.
• Energy and utilities: Cyber vaults protect crucial infrastructure data. These firms must safeguard operational data, power grid data, and control systems against cyberattacks.
  Example: An energy business stores power grid operating data in a cyber vault to protect critical infrastructure controls from attackers. This guarantees electricity and cybersecurity.

• Retail: E-commerce and retail firms manage large amounts of payment, transaction, and inventory data. Cyber vaults that meet PCI-DSS requirements protect this data against breaches.
  Example: A cyber vault holds encrypted client payment information and transaction records for an e-commerce corporation. This secures online purchases by preventing credit card fraud and data breaches.

Cyber vaults protect sensitive data across businesses. These vaults maintain data security, integrity, and availability for ransomware, regulatory compliance, disaster recovery, and IP. Cyber vaults reduce cyber risks, satisfy regulatory requirements, and provide business continuity in the face of increasing threats.

Cyber vault technology is rapidly enhancing data security, resilience, and efficiency as cyber threats advance and laws change. The following trends will shape cyber vaults.

• Advanced encryption: Cyber vaults are using cutting-edge encryption to secure sensitive data from growing cyber dangers.
  - Quantum-resistant encryption: Quantum computing may compromise standard encryption technologies. Post-quantum cryptography is being used in cyber vaults to safeguard data even if quantum computers break encryption.
  - Homomorphic encryption: This method processes encrypted data without decryption during calculations. This improves data security and usability.
• Integration with AI and machine learning: Real-time threat detection and response are transforming cybersecurity.
  - Anomaly detection: Machine learning models are learning to spot questionable access requests, user behavior, and system interactions. This helps firms spot intrusions before they worsen.
  - Automated attack response: AI-driven cyber vaults can separate compromised data, restrict suspicious access attempts, and warn security personnel in real time, decreasing reaction times and harm.
• Enhanced access controls: Cyber vaults are protected by stronger access safeguards as cybercriminals become increasingly adept.
  - Zero trust architecture (ZTA): Organizations are adopting a zero trust paradigm, which requires verification of all access requests, internal and external.
  - Behavioral biometrics: Cyber vaults are using behavioral biometrics like typing speed, mouse movement, and device usage habits to increase authentication security instead of passwords.
• Better data management and compliance: Cyber vaults prioritize regulatory compliance and data organization.
  - Automated compliance monitoring: Built-in compliance tools monitor data handling procedures for GDPR, HIPAA, and PCI-DSS compliance, lowering the risk of non-compliance.
  - Data classification and tagging: AI-powered classification technologies assist companies classify data by sensitivity and relevance for improved security and faster retrieval.
• Scalability and flexibility: With more digital data, cyber vaults are becoming more scalable and flexible to satisfy varied corporate demands.
  - Cloud integration: Many cyber vaults now link with cloud services, giving enterprises cloud infrastructure's scalability and accessibility while retaining security.
  - Hybrid solutions: Hybrid cyber vaults improve resilience, cost effectiveness, and performance by combining on-premises storage with cloud backups.
• User experience and accessibility: Cyber vaults are becoming easier to use, simplifying secure data storage.
  - User-friendly interfaces: Easy-to-use dashboards and designs let managers establish and monitor cyber vaults, eliminating mistakes.
  - Mobile accessibility: Cyber vaults are increasingly offering secure mobile access, allowing authorized staff to recover vital data from anywhere while preserving high security.
• Advanced backup and recovery: To reduce cyber incident downtime, organizations are prioritizing speedy data recovery.
  - Immutable backups: Cyber vaults now provide immutable backups that cannot be changed or destroyed, guaranteeing a tamper-proof data recovery copy.
  - Faster recovery times: Advanced recovery mechanisms are enhancing RTO and RPO, allowing firms to resume operations promptly with minimum disturbance.
• Interoperability and integration: Contemporary cyber vaults are intended to work smoothly with other cybersecurity and IT technologies.
  - API-driven solutions: Many cyber vaults now offer API access, allowing enterprises to integrate them with SIEM, threat intelligence, and other security technologies.
  - Blockchain technology: Some cyber vaults are investigating blockchain for secure, tamper-proof data access and activity tracking. This increases openness and auditability.
• Insider dangers: Organizations are vulnerable to insider attacks, thus cyber vault security is focusing on them.
  - Improved monitoring: Cyber vaults utilize advanced monitoring systems to identify unwanted access by workers, contractors, and partners.
  - User behavior analytics (UBA): UBA solutions detect abnormal user activity patterns including unexpected access requests and massive data transfers.
• Energy efficiency and sustainability: Green computing is driving cyber vault providers to prioritize energy efficiency and sustainability.
  - Green data centers: To lower their carbon impact, several cyber vault providers are switching to energy-efficient, renewable data centers.
  - Resource optimization: Advanced algorithms optimize data storage, computing power, and cooling systems to save energy without sacrificing security or performance.

Cyber vault technology is adapting to a more complicated cybersecurity situation. AI-powered threat detection, quantum-resistant encryption, zero trust security, immutable backups, and cloud integration make cyber vaults more robust, scalable, and user-friendly. These advances will shape cyber resilience and data protection as firms emphasize data security, compliance, and operational continuity.

Enterprises require proactive cybersecurity strategies to prevent, detect, and recover from cyber threats, especially ransomware attacks. HPE offers a robust Zerto Cyber Recovery Vault, integrating hardware and software solutions to minimize data loss and downtime. Below are the key features of HPE’s cyber vault technology.

• Real-time encryption detection: HPE’s cyber vault leverages real-time encryption anomaly detection powered by Zerto and VMware replication. This feature monitors encryption patterns continuously and detects anomalies that could indicate a ransomware attack. Alerts are integrated into cybersecurity management platforms, providing instant notifications when malicious encryption attempts are detected, enabling organizations to respond swiftly.
• Continuous data protection: The Zerto Cyber Recovery Vault ensures near-synchronous data replication through advanced journaling and application-centric protection mechanisms. This enables enterprises to achieve exceptional Recovery Time Objectives (RTOs) and Recovery Point Objectives (RPOs), ensuring minimal data loss and rapid recovery of business-critical applications.
• Physically air-gapped clean room recovery: For enhanced security and isolation, HPE’s vault hardware is physically air-gapped from production networks. The only connectivity exists through a dedicated storage network for data transfer. The vault’s management plane remains inaccessible remotely, meaning only an on-site operator in the data center can access and control it, significantly reducing the risk of external breaches.
• Zero-trust architecture: Built on zero-trust security principles, HPE's cyber vault enforces:
  - Least privilege access, ensuring users only have access to what they strictly need.
  - Dual-operator controls, preventing unauthorized changes or deletions without multiple approvals.
  - This architecture strengthens internal security, reducing the risks of insider threats and unauthorized access.
• Proven HPE production-grade hardware: HPE’s Zerto Cyber Resilience Vault is built on reliable, high-performance enterprise hardware, including:
  - HPE Alletra Storage—for fast, secure, and scalable storage solutions.
  - HPE ProLiant Servers—providing high-performance compute power for vault operations.
  - HPE Aruba Networking—enabling secure, high-speed network connectivity within the cyber vault environment.
  This combination ensures the vault's resilience, scalability, and reliability.
• Immutable storage: HPE leverages HPE Alletra Storage snapshots to store the Zerto recovery journal in an immutable format. This ensures that data within the vault remains tamper-proof and beyond the reach of attackers, making it a reliable and secure backup for recovery operations.
• Non-disruptive testing: With Zerto’s capabilities, disaster recovery (DR) testing can be performed without interrupting production environments. Enterprises can conduct:
  - Full-site failover tests
  - Multiple-site recovery tests
  - Individual VM testing
  This frequent testing ensures that organizations can recover quickly and confidently when a real disaster or cyberattack occurs.
• Orchestration and automation: Fast recovery requires automation and orchestration, and Zerto simplifies this with:
  - One-click failover and recovery for large groups of VMs.
  - Logical grouping of VMs, allowing organizations to migrate or recover entire sites efficiently.
  - Automated processes, ensuring systems come back online as quickly as possible with minimal manual intervention.
  This streamlined recovery process reduces downtime and operational disruptions.
• Reporting and analytics: HPE offers a cloud-based analytics platform through Zerto, providing:
  - A global view of all connected Zerto sites for better management.
  - Automated compliance reports to help organizations meet data protection regulations.
  This ensures that enterprises stay ahead of compliance requirements while maintaining visibility into their data protection posture.

HPE’s Zerto Cyber Recovery Vault delivers a comprehensive cyber resilience solution, combining cutting-edge security, automation, and immutable storage to protect, detect, and recover from cyberattacks. By integrating zero-trust principles, real-time encryption monitoring, physically air-gapped recovery, and enterprise-grade hardware, HPE provides enterprises with a highly secure and reliable cyber vault architecture for minimizing downtime, ensuring data integrity, and maintaining business continuity.