Closing the cyber resilience gap at the data layer

Enterprise infrastructure is evolving fast, and so are the threats targeting it. AI is accelerating the need for modernization and scale across on-premises and hybrid multicloud environments, but it's also putting new power in the hands of bad actors. Add mounting compliance and regulatory pressures to the mix, and one thing becomes clear: Legacy cybersecurity wasn't designed for the threat landscape security leaders face today.

Traditional backups and perimeter-focused strategies simply can’t keep pace with the speed and scale of modern attacks. In today’s environment, resilience is all about immediate, reliable recovery. Yet, despite heavy investments in cybersecurity tools, many enterprises still have a critical blind spot at the data layer.

The latest GigaOm CxO Decision Brief highlights a growing resilience gap between security investments and actual recovery capabilities. The urgency and prevalence of attacks that threaten operational continuity are at all-time highs. A recent Palo Alto Networks study found that 9 out of 10 organizations surveyed faced successful identity-related breaches in the last 12 months. With AI adoption accelerating, closing that gap is becoming a top priority for executive leadership.

What is the resilience gap?

The cyber resilience gap is the disparity between an organization's heavy investments in perimeter cybersecurity tools and its actual ability to recover clean data quickly after a breach.

GigaOm explains that while perimeter security, detection, and backup solutions remain necessary, they don’t guarantee data integrity, fast recovery, or operational continuity. When, not if, prevention fails, many organizations aren’t able to recover quickly enough to avoid disruption—or worse, loss of critical data.

So, how can security and IT leaders close the cyber resilience gap?

The experts agree: Think beyond layered, reactive defenses and traditional backups. Enhance the overall security posture by embedding intelligent resilience capabilities where data actually lives: at the storage layer.

By integrating protection, detection, and recovery directly into the storage layer, organizations can eliminate much of the complexity that burdens SecOps teams today, reducing tool sprawl, automating response and recovery workflows, and enforcing consistent policies across on-premises and hybrid multicloud environments. This not only strengthens security outcomes but also simplifies change management by giving teams a unified, easier-to-manage foundation for resilience. NetApp cyber resilience solutions make this a reality.

What are the key outcomes of data layer resilience?

By prioritizing resilience at the storage layer, organizations can protect their business operations, automate threat response, and ensure rapid, clean recovery in the event of an attack or incident.

• Unify data management, security, and compliance: Safeguard your entire data estate with built-in encryption and governance. Protect data at rest and in transit while enforcing consistent policies across on-premises and hybrid multicloud environments.
• Protect, detect, and recover faster: Leverage AI-powered ransomware and anomaly detection that enables real-time threat identification and immediate response.
• Enable reliable business continuity: Achieve clean recovery that executes in minutes instead of days or weeks, thanks to truly indelible snapshots that guard against tampering and unauthorized access.
• Streamline operational efficiency: Implement real-time detection, automated response, and rapid recovery workflows to simplify SecOps.

What makes NetApp the most secure storage on the planet?

NetApp secures data by providing the only enterprise storage validated by the NSA for top-secret data management, featuring autonomous ransomware protection with over 99% detection accuracy.

At NetApp, when we say we provide the “most secure storage on the planet”, it’s not just marketing fluff. NetApp is uniquely recognized as the first (and only) enterprise storage provider to have data management solutions validated by the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA), meaning our solutions are secure enough for some of the most sensitive data in the world. The NetApp CSfC/NSA validation for management of top-secret data, paired with rigorous certifications like DoD APL and FIPS 140-3, demonstrate our proven commitment to protecting highly sensitive and regulated data. This is one of many reasons why NetApp is the trusted choice for organizations with the strictest compliance demands.

In extensive, rigorous third-party testing by SE Labs, our built-in autonomous ransomware protection capabilities achieved over 99% ransomware detection accuracy for file workloads. While many vendors claim to offer built-in detection features, truly measurable and tested accuracy for their detection capabilities is rarely provided or proven.

Our customers depend on us to make sure their critical applications and data services are as reliable as possible in any event. In one real-world example, NetApp customer Thor Motor Coach avoided disaster during a faulty CrowdStrike software update that crippled business operations for other organizations world. Before partnering with NetApp, their ERP was down 32% of the time, or about 90 minutes per day. Now they have 99.999% availability, which translates to just 5 minutes of downtime per year.

What is real cyber resilience for modern CISOs and CIOs? Leaders

Should define cyber resilience not only by how well they detect attacks but also by how quickly and effectively their organization recovers—without incurring costly downtime and disruption.

GigaOm’s advice is clear: embed robust detection and response capabilities into the data layer, align SecOps and infrastructure teams, and design your systems around clean, rapid recovery, and uninterrupted continuity.

Read the full CxO decision brief from GigaOm to see how you can reduce risk exposure, accelerate time-to-recovery, improve operational resilience and continuity, and achieve consistent protection and visibility for workloads and data across both on-premises and hybrid multicloud environments. Close the resilience gap by turning your data layer into an active security surface and move from reactive defense to true cyber resilience.

Frequently asked questions

Q: Why are traditional backups no longer sufficient for cyber defense?
A: Traditional backups are no longer sufficient because they cannot keep pace with the speed and scale of modern AI-driven attacks, leaving a critical blind spot that prevents organizations from recovering data quickly enough to avoid operational disruption.

Q: How fast can NetApp recover data after a ransomware attack?
A: NetApp enables clean data recovery in minutes instead of days or weeks after a ransomware attack. This is achieved through truly indelible snapshots that prevent tampering and unauthorized or backdoor access.

Q: Is NetApp storage compliant with strict federal security standards?
A: Yes, NetApp is the only enterprise storage provider to have its data management solutions validated by the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA), including CSfC/NSA validation for managing top-secret data.