A spike in attacks due to the rise of remote work prompts many security providers to rethink their strategies and improve their tools.
Nutanix announced new protection layers which include threat monitoring and detection, as well as more granular data replication and robust access controls.
Nutanix is an American cloud computing company that sells hyper-converged infrastructure software since 2009.
These new capabilities make it easier for the company to implement security and business continuity best practices natively, at the infrastructure level rather than rely on a complex system comprising of add-on security products.
Nutanix expects these new capabilities to help its customers in the prevention and detection of ransomware attacks across multiple cloud environments.
Gartner, a prominent research company, reported about new strains of ransomware in 2020 that make prevention and planning more important than ever for preventing ransomware attacks.
In its recent report Gartner wrote that in 2020 “there have been swift changes to threats with increased remote work and targeted malware campaigns that take advantage of worldwide events, such as COVID-19. Ransomware has evolved… to include more advanced techniques, such as fileless malware and data exfiltration.”
This means that organizations, especially those which adopted remote or hybrid work environments, can no longer rely on standard tools to protect themselves.
The Nutanix cloud platform offers anomaly detection based on machine learning and IP reputation services. The company’s security networking operations and monitoring solution, Flow Security Central, is the backbone of this process.
Flow Security Central identifies known attack vectors, including potential ransomware, at the network level and doesn’t let them reach the application and data layers. The module also monitors endpoints and blocks traffic coming from disreputable locations, which is especially important for defending Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) deployments that are usually the first targets for ransomware.
Nutanix cloud platform’s Nutanix Files and Nutanix Objects modules provide file and object analytics that prevent tampering and destruction of files and guard against unauthorized encryption or deletion of data to stop many common ransomware attacks.
Nutanix Objects’ locking feature meets the non-rewritable and non-erasable storage requirements for electronic records as per the relevant SEC, FINRA, and CFTC regulations.
No doubt that both detection and prevention are instrumental to an effective strategy against malware and ransomware. But companies must have a way to recover from a possible attack.
Nutanix Mine, the company’s backup solution, provides backup options that are natively available to its customers.
“CIOs and CISOs know that there is no one solution that provides 100% protection against ransomware or other types of malware attacks,” said Rajiv Mirani, Chief Technology Officer at Nutanix. “Enterprises need a defense in-depth approach to security, starting with their IT infrastructure… Nutanix delivers a strengthened cloud platform out of the box, with an even richer set of ransomware protection is available now.”
