A 12-year-old Dublin, Ohio company recently experienced a data breach of the worst kind. While no financial data was compromised, the loss may have been even more painful, as someone hacked into their servers, erasing and corrupting files that represented years of work. Hosted on Amazon Web Services, the company, Idea Buyer, LLC, had to shut its doors. There was no way to recover.
This is a story that happens far too often, and in at least 10% of these cases, the businesses are shuttered forever. Such a loss is devastating, not just for the business owner and employees, but for their customers, whose apps and websites were built on their servers. Those apps and websites were also compromised, and the ripple effect is still being felt. Idea Buyer worked with a cybersecurity company after the fact to try and recover the data on the servers and the incident has been reported to the FBI, but there was nothing that could be done. The malicious attack put the company out of business, and anyone who had their app business on the company server was wiped out, too.
It Takes More than Cloud Hosting to Protect Your Company
Would things have turned out differently if this company had been working with a managed IT and cloud hosting firm that knew them and knew their business? We’d like to think so. No one can guarantee that their clients won’t have a cyber incident; all they can do is minimize the threat with available tools. But we’d like to think that if Idea Buyer been working with someone who understood their business model – and the significance of what was being stored on their servers – that there would have been redundant, isolated backups, layers of security, and more importantly, in-depth discussions about mitigating risk. We would have talked to them about offsite BDR and provided training that hopefully would have prevented the chain of events that preceded the cyber-attack that gave the hackers access.
This Story Could Have Had a Different Ending
Had this company worked with a local managed IT firm instead of just buying cloud storage space on Amazon or Microsoft, they would have been able to enlist the aid of their local tech team when the complaints from their customers started rolling in. The hack may not have been prevented, but with an MSP that understood their business and could work on their behalf to mitigate the damage, they would have been able to quickly switch over to a backup and recovery protocol, to ensure that they could open their doors the next day.
You can obtain cloud hosting virtually anywhere. You can buy cybersecurity monitoring and firewalls without ever talking to anyone. But if you want someone as invested in the success of your business as you are, it pays to work with someone who will get to know your business and understand your needs – and work side by side with you to achieve your goals – not just ratchet up your space allocation every time you get a new client.
At thinkCSC, the relationship we have with our clients is one of the most important aspects of what we do. We’re not just selling storage space and providing cloud hosting. We are partners in your success. We get to know your business, your people, and your company, working to develop solutions that make it easier for you to achieve your goals, protect your assets, and minimize the risks you take as you grow. Don’t let your business become a statistic. Get in touch.
