Immutable S3 Data Storage – What’s all the Fuss About?

Tamper proof data storage for cloud and on-premise IT systems.

Over recent years the digital economy has transformed our business and personal lives as technology becomes the lifeblood of innovation, growth, and sustainability.

Business relies on data, and data is everywhere, albeit in a controlled state. It’s held by employees on a wide range of devices, it’s on business servers, and in disparate hybrid and hyperscale cloud solutions.

Organisational data is accessed via operating systems, databases, and applications … and by employees, partners, automated intelligence, scripted API’s and more.

Data is critical to the success of a business, and data compromises (including extortion by cybercriminals) can have a catastrophic effect - including loss of revenue and reputation, breaches in compliance and regulation, and damaging litigation.

It's no wonder that businesses are highly protective of their data as the number of moving parts grows exponentially, exposing vulnerabilities across the expanding attack surface area.

Cybersecurity Arms Race

Cybercrime tactics have adapted to target mission critical systems and data, and Ransomware attacks are now a major threat to operational performance and business survival.

The risk to survival after an attack, and the ever increasing regulatory and compliance demands are driving business leaders to do everything in their power to protect data and systems – or face the threat of prosecution!

I’ve spoken previously of the on-going ‘arms race’ between cybercriminals and the IT industry, and as each protagonist ‘ups their game’ - the stakes get even higher.

This is how S3 storage and backup offers significant additional value, particularly where data immutability (tamper proof protection) is embedded within the solution. S3 is a highly secure, scalable, reliable, and affordable storage and archiving solution that is simple to use, accessible from anywhere, and compatible with cloud based and on-premise IT systems. When combined with immutability features, an additional layer of protection is added to ensure data cannot be tampered with during a pre-defined and specific period of time.

How does it work

For the more technically minded, S3 stores data files as ‘objects’ in S3 ‘buckets’ that are then managed in-house, or by us - using an easy to use and intuitive cloud-based interface.

Our S3 solution platform is a highly secure and robust storage infrastructure for primary and mission-critical data, and any other data that needs careful handling.

Data versioning is protected with logical retrieval, restoration and preservation of all achieved information, enabling swift recovery from system failures and unforeseen downtime, where the service defaults to the most recently updated information of whatever document, file or record is required.

The S3 protocol is gaining widespread popularity across cloud services, data protection applications, and software-as-a-service (SaaS) solutions, as it’s a simple and smart business decision due to its enhanced data protection capabilities, simplicity of operation and commercial accessibility and viability.

The standout critical feature is the immutability element of the service, which ensures bad actors, and the loose fingered, are not able to tamper with or delete information, in line with data retention policies.

Compliance and regulation

Services operate above and beyond the Bailiwick Financial Services Commission recommendations, and customer data is only ever held in our highly secure, resilient and replicated, Tier 3 island-based datacentres, with storage and archiving options to suit all types and sizes of organisation.

We provide immediate retrieval of information including up to ’11 nines’ data certainty and immutable backup features that are ransomware safe for all types of storage, including very high-performance data workloads.

Scalable, reliable, future-proof

Customers can integrate our S3 services with existing infrastructures as a core building block of formalised IT security processes, policy, and governance - and it integrates with our cloud-based Recovery-as-a-Service (RaaS) backup and business continuity solution for peace of mind and operational assurance.

S3 also works with wider backup technologies designed for long-term archiving, including Sure’s own protection offering for Microsoft 365 services including OneDrive, SharePoint, email and Teams.

And in contrast to competing services, there’s no devil in the detail … its simplicity itself, with an easy-to-use interface and a simple charging structure offering exceptional value for money.

Our data and security consultants are always available to discuss any aspect of your data storage, archiving, and security needs - and as a team of locally based experts, we understand the unique requirements of organisations across our islands.