Actifio Helping Waste Industries, Cengage & Others Achieve Cyber Resilience

WALTHAM, Mass., April 19, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- Actifio, the Data-as-a-Service software company, is helping a growing number of enterprises achieve cyber resilience. Waste Industries and Cengage are among the latest of many Actifio customers confronting cybersecurity threats such as ransomware and rogue users destroying backups head-on with Actifio's pioneering data-centric platform. Built on Actifio's patented Data Virtualization and OnVault technologies for high business resiliency and availability, these cyber resiliency capabilities deliver tamper-proof, immutable point-in-time versions of enterprise application data and, in the event of a cyber-attack, instant recovery to a safe point-in-time.

Protection against cyber threats is a critical business imperative for every enterprise, and exposure to these threats continues to grow. Ransomware damages reached $5 billion in 2017, up 15x in two years, according to CyberSecurity Ventures. A company is hit with ransomware every 40 seconds, according to endpoint security vendor Barkly. The traditional approach has been to repeatedly layer new network-based security protection tools that serve as temporary measures until a newer technique is employed by attackers.

Actifio delivers a secular solution that protects the heart of every enterprise: Data. Actifio is enabling an industry-first data-centric approach to cybersecurity that ensures this strategic asset is protected regardless of evolving threats.

• Actifio Data Virtualization technology reduces the data surface area of attack by over 90%, significantly narrowing down the window for a cyber or ransomware attack threat.
• Actifio OnVault technology provides air-gap and data immutability between the production data and resiliency copies by creating an immutable backup copy on low-cost object storage, on-premises or in the cloud, ensuring that applications and businesses are highly available and instantly recoverable from any cyber-attack.
• For long-term data retention, encryption at rest, encryption in transit, role-based access control, and audit tracking, data immutability ensures enterprises satisfy their compliance needs.
• Actifio provides a unique, no-compromise approach that gives users the freedom of self-serve data access, while providing operations teams the complete visibility of where data is, who is accessing it and the control to revoke access at any point.
• The Actifio platform enables compliance with the Sheltered Harbor, Appendix J requirements for financial services businesses by enabling data immutability, high availability and fast recovery in the event of a cyber-attack.
• The ability to recover applications to a safe point-in-time version within minutes is the most effective way to render ransomware attacks irrelevant.
• Actifio's tamper-proof, immutable data repository protects organizations from threats by internal bad actors attempting attacks on enterprise data.

Two of the latest enterprises to protect themselves from ransomware with Actifio are Waste Industries and Cengage. Waste Industries is a provider of non-hazardous solid waste recycling, collection and disposal services, and one of the top 10 haulers in the U.S. Cengage is a leading provider of digital learning solutions that propel students toward a brighter future. Both Waste Industries and Cengage rely on Actifio to reduce security risks and improve their overall cyber resiliency. Waste Industries and Cengage were able to curb security risks, especially ransomware attacks, by reducing the data threat surface area and instantly recovering the business to a safe point-in-time version.

"We knew we were in need of a solution that promoted greater resiliency," said Hubert Barkley, Vice President of Information and Technology Services at Waste Industries, "This opened the door for change, particularly in the security space. By implementing Actifio, we were able to significantly curb security risk, especially ransomware attacks, which has proven key in our overall growth as a company."

"As a leader in the digital learning space, propelling learning with digital materials, we needed a reliable, secure data solution to help aid our transition to a fully digital enterprise," said Jim Chilton, CIO of Cengage. "Actifio has exceeded our expectations in helping us digitally transform, with the added benefits of curbing ransomware attacks and taking all concern about cybersecurity threats out of the picture."

To hear how IBM Security relies on Actifio to deliver for its customers, this brief video from theCube explains it. For a brief video demo from Actifio's chief security officer showing Actifio software in action rendering a ransomware attack harmless in minutes, go here.

Steve Duplessie, Founder and Senior Analyst at the Enterprise Strategy Group, said, "Ransomware isn't just a buzzword.  We know that 22% of organizations came under attack weekly in 2017.  In retail, attacks occur daily!  You won't keep bad guys out – you can only mitigate the damage they can do by being ready to respond – and Actifio's solution enables you to almost instantly get back to a safe state with known good data – and run your applications just as fast as you did before.  "Instant on" is a primary benefit to their Data as a Service platform."

Ash Ashutosh, Founder and CEO of Actifio, said, "Our mission is to enable enterprises to deliver data as a strategic asset. Ensuring data is safe and recoverable amidst rising cybersecurity and ransomware attacks is a critical step in this process. Rather than the traditional network-based approach of securing an enterprise, we are delivering a pioneering data-centric approach that protects and instantly recovers what really matters: Data. Immutability of data from attacks, internal or external, combined with the ability to instantly recover to a safe point-in-time is key to high business availability and meeting compliance requirements, even in the face of malicious attacks."

About Actifio
Actifio is the world's leading Data-as-a-Service (DaaS) platform. It enables thousands of users around the world to deliver their data just as they deliver their applications and infrastructure... as a service available instantly, anywhere. An enterprise-class software platform powered by patented Virtual Data Pipeline™ technology, Actifio frees data from traditional infrastructure to accelerate adoption of hybrid cloud, build higher quality applications faster, and improve business resiliency and availability. For more, visit Actifio.com or follow us on Twitter @Actifio.

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SOURCE Actifio