Moving Away from Autonomy EAS Archives
Where cloud computing was once an interesting option for organizations, it has now become a business imperative. That statement becomes ever more pertinent as more and more businesses, and even entire industries are disrupted by new ‘born in the cloud’ challengers. It’s time for the incumbents to take action against this persistent threat, taking steps to modernize their operations and remain competitive in a fast-moving market. The cloud, of course, is key. By providing businesses with measurably better cost efficiency, enhanced and customizable security, and much-needed agility, organizations can react quickly to changes in their market while unlocking new capabilities, including ways to manipulate and analyze data. By making use of powerful, cloud-based tools including AI (Artificial Intelligence), ML (Machine Learning), and advanced analytics, they can beat disruptive competitors at their own game and, in many cases, take advantage of their amassed historic data to achieve a position of superiority in their industry.
The chances are that your organization already uses the cloud in some form already, whether it’s through tools for productivity, communication, or collaboration. However, to benefit fully from the cloud, a complete data migration is required. By migrating legacy on-premises or first-generation cloud data archives to a modern cloud environment, you can provide your business with the tools it needs to survive and thrive in a quickly evolving, cloud-based world.
The migration must be fast, carried out in a legally defensible manner, and shouldn’t carry the risk of data corruption, inadvertent data deletion, end-user productivity issues, or damage to chain of custody. By checking all of those boxes, you will not only drive your digital transformation strategy forward but begin to see benefits to your business from day one.
Cloud Migration: Your Two Main Options
There are two main cloud platform options available today; Software as a Service (SaaS) and Platform as a Service (PaaS). Of the two cloud migration options available, a SaaS cloud seems like the easiest option. A SaaS archiving solution like Global Relay, Mimecast or Smarsh, might appear to do everything you need; however they bring with them many drawbacks. SaaS solutions come at the cost of losing control over your organization’s sensitive data, from the security measures used to protect it to keeping direct control of the encryption keys that unlock it.
The second option includes none of these caveats. Migrating to your own, managed and secured PaaS-based public cloud tenant enables you to choose the best archiving or information management solution, as well as determine the precise security capabilities that match your organization’s carefully planned risk posture and protocols.
The Sad Truth of SaaS Security Stats
In a recent survey of global IT executives, including VPs, Directors, and members of the C-suite at major corporations, only 19% of those surveyed believed 75% or more of their SaaS vendors met all their security requirements. 70% stated they had been forced to make at least one security exception for a SaaS vendor. While many of these organizations are likely using popular SaaS products like Microsoft Office 365 and Salesforce, where the size and standing of the vendor might make the business more amenable to accepting a perceived lower risk, the clear takeaway is that many SaaS solutions don’t provide the security standards and flexibility modern organizations require.
On the topic of encryption keys, an astounding 95% of respondents believed it was important to control their own encryption keys, and 81% were uncomfortable with their SaaS vendors controlling them. However, 74% of those surveyed said they did not control the encryption keys for the majority of their SaaS solutions. This is a worrying statistic and one that many organizations will have to take steps to reverse as regulations continue to tighten and the threat of cybercrime grows. To that end, 92% of executives said they would require more security customization in the future, with 63% of them planning to retire current SaaS applications that don’t provide them control over encryption key creation and management.
These statistics paint a clear picture of the security landscape and the risk that the one-size-fits-all approach of SaaS vendors introduces. As the trend for security customization continues and scrutiny over data access and handling increases, SaaS solutions will become increasingly less palatable for organizations’ risk mitigation efforts. Instead, more secure and customizable solutions will be a major focus.
Stunted Security: SaaS vendors don’t let you control…
- Physical data center security
- Encryption keys
- Custom compliance reporting
- Cloud-native directories
- Firewall and firewall rules
- Application security analysis
- Identity management/Access controls
- Threat detection
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Multi-Tenant SaaS vs Dedicated SaaS: what you need to know
All cloud archives are not created equal. There are major differences between archives deployed in a dedicated SaaS model versus a multi-tenant model that affect the security, accessibility and functionality of your archived data. This Technical Guide explores what you will need to consider in order to make an informed decision.
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Archive360 Email Migration Software Product Highlights
Archive360 offers the most trusted email archive migration solution available - specifically designed for the Autonomy EAS archive. Fully integrated with the solution’s APIs for faster, more accurate data extractions, Archive360 extracts messages and attachments, including all metadata, directly from the archive, and maintains an item-level audit trail for compliance and legal reporting. It also preserves complete, original message fidelity for eDiscovery and regulatory information requests.
