All images and data sources credit Veeam Software or Jason Buffington
Veeam® Software’s live LinkedIn series on Mondays in June discussed Backup as a Service (BaaS) and Disaster Recovery as a Service (DRaaS). Both topics are near and dear to our hearts. Veeam’s Jason Buffington (@jbuff) and Dave Russell (@backupdave) hosted and reviewed survey research findings for BaaS and DRaaS during their midmarket spotlight, ultimately concluding, “Why BaaS when you can DRaaS?” (And we think his shirt — compliments of GDV — is pretty cool.)
What does BaaS mean?
Defining backup as a service varies a bit in definition and importance to companies in this space. According to the Veeam poll, backup software running in/from the cloud without on-premises hardware (we read this as an appliance of some sort) was the most common “definition” and also the most significant.
Interestingly, using the cloud as an alternative to tape for long-term archival was the least important aspect, yet possibly one of the original use case ideas for cloud backups. Along with the meaning and what is important, organization size plays a role:
Here, we see that software-only and remotely-managed solutions are the most prevalent ‘must-haves’ for organizations of any size. The research shows that organizations don’t want appliances, and they want someone else to manage the solution. While an excellent option to get backups offsite or provide long-term retention, BaaS is not a complete solution for disaster recovery. BaaS infrastructures typically only allow for restores up to and including full virtual machines, but not the ability to run those virtual machines in a cloud environment in the event of a disaster or extended outage.
What does DRaaS mean?
Similar to BaaS, DRaaS is simply offloading disaster recovery to cloud resources owned by a service provider of some type. The difference with DRaaS is that you get the ability to run workloads in the cloud environment should a disaster strike or you face extended outages. Organizations often struggle with disaster recovery due to the cost and complexity of maintaining separate environments in a location far enough away from production resources to avoid collateral damage, which is what we see as the primary use case for DRaaS.
Selecting a BaaS/DRaaS provider
Research shows that data security is the number one reason for choosing their current BaaS or DRaaS provider across companies of all sizes. Modern malware, ransomware, and viruses target backup files, especially those in remote locations, to prevent victims from quickly restoring their data.
Cybersecurity threats can live undetected in files, folders, backups, operating systems, etc., for long periods to ensure their proliferation. If infection or corruption occurs and goes unnoticed for 30 days, you will have 30 days of backups that you cannot use, and the same goes for replicated systems. Features like Enhanced Data Protection help shield your BaaS- and DRaaS-protected data.
Expertise is another consideration, as organizations do not need to extensively train or hire employees to manage the service, instead simply offloading it to a trusted provider.
Knowing that backup as a service is not a disaster recovery solution on its own, we again ask the question–why BaaS when you can DRaaS?
See the whole series with Jason and Dave:
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