How to Recover Data From Wasabi Cloud Storage with DPX vPlus

Introduction

DPX vPlus is a reliable backup and snapshot management solution that offers seamless data recovery for virtual environments and Microsoft 365. In a previous blog, we provided the steps for How To Use Wasabi Hot Cloud Storage for DPX vPlus Backup Storage. In this step-by-step guide, we will walk you through the process of recovering data from Wasabi Cloud Storage using DPX vPlus. Whether you need to recover virtual machines or Microsoft 365 resources, this guide has got you covered. Let’s get started! 

Note: This guide assumes that you have already backed up your data to Wasabi cloud storage and have properly configured DPX vPlus.

Ad-Hoc Recovery of Virtual Machines from Wasabi Cloud Storage

  • Open DPX vPlus Dashboard
    1.  On the left-hand menu, click on “Virtual Environments” and then “Instances” to access the list of discovered virtual machines.
    2.  Scroll or use the search bar to find the specific VM you want to recover.
  • Initiate the Restore Job:
    1.  Click the second button from the right to open the Restore job creation wizard.
  • Select the Snapshot:
    1.   In the Restore Job wizard, choose the snapshot that you wish to recover.
    2.   Look for the snapshot ending with the destination that indicates it is stored in Wasabi object storage.
  • Specify the Recovery Destination:
    1.   Select “Restore to Hypervisor” and choose the hypervisor host where you want to recover the VM.
  • Configure the Restore Options:
    1.   Complete the restore wizard, following the specific process for your hypervisor.
    2.   Depending on your requirements, you may have options to delete the existing VM or change the name of the new VM.
  • Start the Restore Task:
    1.   Click “Restore” to initiate the task.
    2.   Monitor the progress by accessing the “Workflow Executions Console” at the bottom of the screen.

Ad-Hoc Recovery of Microsoft 365 Resources from Wasabi Cloud Storage

  • Open DPX vPlus Dashboard:
    1.  On the left-hand menu, click on “Cloud” and then “Instances” to view the list of Microsoft 365 resources.
  • Locate the Owner of the Resource:
    1.  Scroll or use the search bar to find the owner of the resource you need to recover.
  • Access Protected Data:
    1.  Click on the name of the owner to open a new window.
    2.  Scroll down until you find the “Protected Data” tab and open it.
  • Select the Application:
    1.  On the left side, you will see tabs for each MS application protected for that user (e.g., Exchange, OneDrive, Chats).
    2.  Browse through the tabs to find the specific application that contains the resource you want to recover.
  • Choose the Restore Option:
    1.  Browse through the application (e.g., OneDrive, Mailbox) to find the individual resource you need to recover.
    2.  Select the item you want to restore.
  • Restore the Item:
    1.  To restore the item back to a location within MS 365 cloud, click the “Restore” button in the top-right corner.
    2.  This will open a short Restore wizard where you can specify alternate restoration paths, overwrite existing files, or choose an alternate User, Group, Team, or Site for restoration.
    3.  Alternatively, to download the item to your local machine, click the “Download” button in the top-right corner.
    4.  Once the download preparation is complete, you can find the item for download under the “Download” section in the “Cloud” tab of the left-hand menu.

Scheduled Recovery Using Recovery Plans

  • Open DPX vPlus Dashboard:
    1.  On the left-hand menu, click on “Virtual Environments” and then “Recovery Plans.”
    2.  Click the “Create” button on the right-hand side to create a new Recovery Plan.
  • Create the Recovery Plan:
    1.  Give the new Recovery Plan a descriptive name and click “Save”.
    2.  Rules can be added to this plan later.
  • Add a Rule:
    1.  Scroll down and click “Add Rule” to schedule a recurring restore.
  • Configure the Rule:
    1.  Provide a name for the rule and click “Next”.
    2.  Select the Virtualization Platform and the VM(s) you want to include in this plan.
    3.  Click “Next”.
  • Select or Create the Schedule:
    1.  Choose an existing schedule or create a new one that suits your recovery plan.
    2.  Click “Next”.
  • Define Restore Parameters:
    1.  Proceed through the “Restore Parameters” section, specifying details such as the backup to use for recovery, recovery destination, storage, and the name for the new VM.
    2.  Once done, click “Save”.

Conclusion

With DPX vPlus and Wasabi Cloud Storage, recovering data from backups has never been easier. In this guide, we covered the step-by-step process for ad-hoc recovery of virtual machines and Microsoft 365 resources. Additionally, we explored scheduled recovery plans to automate recurring restores. By following these instructions, you can confidently recover your valuable data using DPX vPlus and Wasabi Cloud Storage. Contact us for a demonstration, trial and pricing.

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06/19/2023 0 Comments

Microsoft 365 Backup to Wasabi Hot Cloud Storage 

As businesses increasingly adopt Microsoft 365 services and applications, it’s essential to use cost-effective, fast, and reliable data backup solutions. While many assume that Microsoft 365 has built-in data protection, it’s important to remember that data protection is always the responsibility of your company, especially when it comes to meeting traditional backup, regulatory, and compliance policies. That’s where Catalogic DPX vPlus for Microsoft 365 comes in to provide a comprehensive Microsoft 365 backup solution. 

DPX vPlus provides continuous protection for critical business data in Microsoft 365, including file versioning and optional compression and deduplication. With DPX vPlus, businesses get the whole package of necessary tools to backup and recover Microsoft cloud application and services data, including Exchange Online, SharePoint Online, OneDrive for Business, and Microsoft Teams. With granular and point-in-time restore options, flexible retention and backup schedules, and automatic protection of new users, DPX vPlus makes it easy to backup and recover Microsoft 365 backup data. 

But what about software and storage costs? That’s where this joint solution shines. DPX vPlus for Microsoft 365 with Wasabi Hot Cloud Storage offers the least expensive backup solution to lower your costs for backing up your Microsoft 365 data. DPX vPlus for Microsoft 365 is a comprehensive data protection solution for businesses that need to backup and recover their critical data. With granular and point-in-time restore options, flexible retention and backup schedules, and automatic protection of new users, DPX vPlus makes it easy to backup and recover Microsoft 365 backup data.  

With Wasabi Hot Cloud Storage, businesses can store their backups off-site in a fast, affordable, and secure way. Wasabi’s simple pricing model with no hidden fees means that businesses only pay for the cloud storage they use, making it the perfect solution for cost-conscious businesses.  

In conclusion, DPX vPlus for Microsoft 365 and Wasabi as a cloud storage provider offer the least expensive joint solution to lower your cost for Microsoft 365 backup. With the comprehensive data protection features of DPX vPlus and Wasabi’s affordable and secure cloud storage, businesses can backup and recover their critical data without breaking the bank. 

Resources for further learning:

Datasheet: Catalogic DPX vPlus for Microsoft 365

Demonstration videoVideo for DPX vPlus for Microsoft 365

Setup Guide: How To Use Wasabi Hot Cloud Storage for DPX vPlus Backup Storage 

 

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05/25/2023 0 Comments

DPX Extends Support for Micro Focus Open Enterprise Server 2023

In the ever-evolving landscape of data protection and enterprise server management, Catalogic DPX continues to pave the way with its advanced features and broad compatibility. With the recent release of Open Enterprise Server (OES) 2023, DPX takes it a step further by integrating seamlessly with this cutting-edge platform. In this blog, we explore how Catalogic DPX provides Micro Focus OES backups, granular OES file restore capabilities and OES ransomware protection while also highlighting its newfound compatibility with OES 2023.

Granular File Restore for Micro Focus OES Backups

Unlike many other backup providers, like Unitrends, who have distanced themselves from OES by removing support for granular OES backups, Catalogic DPX offers an advanced solution for organizations utilizing Micro Focus OES by providing granular file restore capabilities. With this feature, users can easily recover individual files and folders from their backups, eliminating the need for a full system restore. Whether it’s a critical document or a lost file, DPX empowers users with the ability to swiftly restore specific items, ensuring minimal downtime and maximum productivity.

Ransomware Protection with Catalogic DPX

This should come as no surprise to anyone, but ransomware attacks continue to pose a significant threat to organizations’ data integrity and operational continuity. To combat this menace, DPX incorporates robust ransomware protection measures including snapshot immutability, air-gapped backup destinations, and most recently, proactive ransomware scanning through GuardMode. Through these measures, DPX ensures that not only are backups protected from malicious encryption attempts, but also that data in production is not compromised before the data is snapshotted and moved to vStor. This way, in the event of a ransomware incident, organizations can confidently rely on DPX to restore clean, uninfected copies of their data, effectively thwarting the attackers’ objectives.

Integration with OES 2023

In addition to its existing capabilities, Catalogic DPX now extends its support to OES 2023. This integration opens up new avenues for organizations to leverage Catalogic’s advanced features while enjoying the benefits of the latest Micro Focus platform. With DPX seamlessly integrated with OES 2023, organizations can confidently protect their data, restore files at a granular level, and fortify their backups against ransomware threats.

Efficient Backup and Recovery Workflow

Catalogic DPX simplifies the backup and recovery process for Micro Focus OES environments. Administrators can easily configure backup policies, automate backup schedules, and monitor job statuses through a user-friendly interface. Catalogic DPX optimizes the backup workflow, minimizing the impact on system resources and ensuring efficient data protection.

By utilizing DPX’s support for OES 2023 backups, organizations can also enhance data availability and strengthen their business continuity strategies. The seamless integration ensures that critical data on Micro Focus OES is effectively protected and readily recoverable, minimizing potential downtime and enabling uninterrupted operations.

Catalogic DPX for OES 2023

Catalogic DPX brings granular file restore capabilities and ransomware protection to Micro Focus OES backups, empowering organizations to safeguard their data effectively. With the recent integration of DPX with OES 2023, organizations can further leverage its advanced features and extend their data protection capabilities. Whether it’s recovering individual files or fortifying backups against ransomware threats, Catalogic DPX offers a comprehensive solution for Micro Focus OES environments, now enhanced by its compatibility with OES 2023.

Additional Information

If you would like to learn more, please contact us or request a demo.  For additional reading on DPX support of OES, please see:

 

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05/11/2023 0 Comments

How To Use Wasabi Hot Cloud Storage for DPX vPlus Backup Storage

DPX vPlus is an enterprise-ready, agentless backup and snapshot management solution for Microsoft 365 and virtual environments. It allows you to reliably improve and automate backup performance, automate recovery tests, and significantly save resources, time, and money. Microsoft 365 backups and virtual machines backups can be stored on-premises, on a local file system or share, or can be stored in the cloud using cloud storage. Wasabi backup storage delivers fast to write, low cost, and reliable cloud object storage, that also provides faster speeds than Amazon S3. Wasabi backup storage charges no egress fees, and provides 100% data immutability, so you can be confident that your backup data is tamper-proof. 

This article provides the steps to use Wasabi cloud storage as DPX vPlus backup storage.  

Configuration Pre-Requisites 

  • DPX vPlus version 5.0 or higher 
  • Active Wasabi account with access to Wasabi console

Reference Architecture Diagram 

Wasabi Configuration 

1. Login to Wasabi console and Click on “Create Bucket” to create a new standard bucket. Please refer to Creating a Wasabi bucket for information to create a bucket. 

2. Create an Access key and Secret key for the root user. Make sure to download the key file in order to retrieve your secret key again. 

DPX vPlus Configuration

Follow the below steps to configure DPX vPlus to use Wasabi backup storage: 

1. Log in to the DPX vPlus web UI 

2. Navigate to the Backup Destinations Tab -> Object Storage. Then click on “Create Backup Destination” and select “Amazon S3 / S3-compatible.”

3. In the Create Backup Destination window, input the name for your backup destination and choose the node configurations as needed.

4. In Amazon S3 / S3-Compatible Settings, provide the information about your bucket 

Make sure the flags “Path style access enabled” and “Parallel Download enabled” are enabled. 

5. Input the Access key and Secret key and then click “Save” to save the configuration. 

6. Test the connectivity by selecting the Wasabi destination and clicking “Test Connectivity.

7. The results can be viewed in the Task Console.

8. Click on Virtual Environments and then Backup SLA’s to create a Backup SLA and protect your Virtual Environments, Containers, Microsoft 365 and Applications using Wasabi backup storage. Configure the settings under “General” tab.  

9. Configure Settings under the Rule tab. Select the Wasabi cloud storage as the destination, define the retention settings, and assign the policy to a schedule. If you have not yet created a schedule, you can assign this policy to a schedule at a later time.

10. If you do not assign the policy to Virtual Machines during creation or want to assign new VMs to an existing Backup Policy, you can do so by clicking on “Virtual Environments” and then “instances.” Select the instance and click “Assign policy” and then select the policy created in step 4.8 above. Click “Save” to save the policy assignment. 

11. Start a backup by selecting the instance and clicking the backup icon.

12. The progress of the backup can be viewed on the task console. 

For any support or setup questions, please get in touch with Catalogic Technical Support at dpsupport@catalogicsoftware.com.

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04/28/2023 0 Comments

Microsoft 365 – Why OneDrive Backup is Needed

It is clear that the cloud is replacing physical storage formats due to its collaboration and access features,  its cost-effectiveness, and data security and resiliency. As organizations continue to store more and more, cloud storage will continue to increase in popularity. One of the most popular forms of cloud storage used by organizations today is Microsoft OneDrive. 

 

OneDrive is a productivity tool that allows users to synchronize files across different endpoints and share those files with other users in the enterprise. It is one of the several applications that make up the Microsoft 365 suite. The other applications include Exchange, Teams, and SharePoint. OneDrive is designed for users to store and share files, along with other collaboration capabilities that make not only daily jobs easier but also the management of shared files across different team members. The great thing about OneDrive being a cloud storage destination is that it enables employees to access their business files, as well as files shared by other people or teams, from different connected devices. In today’s world of remote working, access flexibility is incredibly useful.  

 

However, along with these valuable benefits, comes one major risk: data loss from a lack of OneDrive backups. 

 

How Microsoft 365 Protects Your Data 

Many may be thinking, “If Microsoft is providing the cloud storage, wouldn’t they be responsible for protecting the data in OneDrive?” The answer to that question is “Not exactly.” In the world of software-as-a-service or the SaaS model, data protection is considered a shared responsibility. Though Microsoft does take on the responsibility of application and infrastructure uptime, and it does provide many built-in features that feel like Office 365 backups, none of them really provide what is truly needed when it comes to Microsoft 365 backup and disaster recovery. Actual data protection against site outages, accidental deletion, and ransomware is the end user’s responsibility. 

 

Now, it was mentioned above that Microsoft does have native tools that help with some data protection. These include things like the Recycle Bin, deletion retention policies, and file versioning. In a similar article about Why SharePoint backup is needed. these features are described in greater detail. But at the end of the day, these features only protect you in the short term, and do not truly protect you against data loss.  

 

Lack of Microsoft 365 Backup Leaves You Exposed 

Because of this shared responsibility and lack of true built-in data protection features, it is critical that end users perform regular OneDrive backups (and other Microsoft 365 backups). Much like information stored on the internet, there are many threats to your data stored in OneDrive However, due to the shared nature of files in OneDrive, these threats can become even more dangerous. 

 

Accidental Deletion 

Because of the synchronization of files in OneDrive, something as simple as an accidental deletion of files becomes much more difficult to recover from. When an end user makes a change to a file (intentional or not), that change is synchronized with local storage on user endpoints, and then faithfully replicated to the OneDrive copy in the cloud. If the file is not backed up, not only is the original file gone for good, but any change is replicated across all connected devices in the cloud. 

 

Malware/Ransomware 

Keeping that in mind, you can imagine how disastrous a malware or ransomware attack would be if it were able to access data in OneDrive. Because OneDrive offers its users a straightforward way to sync the work that they have done offline to their storage as soon as they go online, this exposes your IT structures to a greater risk of external threats. Imagine an end user’s endpoint is infected with some form of malware and while offline this malware gets access to this user’s shared OneDrive. This malware may be encrypting or mass-deleting files, and then, when back online these changes are synchronized in the cloud. This malware can then spread further, slowly infecting all of the information, as well as other connected devices that are used to access the OneDrive data. This is even more serious if your company uses a BYOD (“Bring your own device”) model for remote and/or on-site work. 

 

Retrieval of Data from Past Employees 

When an employee leaves an organization, and their Microsoft 365 license is relinquished, Microsoft allows 30 to 90 days of time for the organization to migrate the user’s data or store a copy of the OneDrive data in another location, before it is deleted. Oftentimes, in order to recover unused cloud storage, organizations tend to delete unnecessary, redundant or outdated data. Without OneDrive backup in place, there is no way to recover specific files that might not seem important until later in the future 

 

Regulatory Compliance

It is not uncommon for organizations, especially in certain industries, to be subject to several different legal regulations like Sarbanes Oxley, HIPAA, or the GDPR. These regulations often dictate details about what type of data will be stored, how it can be gathered, and how long the companies are obligated to retain that data. These regulations also may require a second or backup copy of certain data to be stored at an alternate site. If these organizations fail to hold onto that second copy or cannot produce a certain piece of data when requested, they may face serious legal or regulatory repercussions. 

 

Effective OneDrive Backup and Recovery 

All of the above are reasons why organizations are utilizing DPX vPlus for their OneDrive backup. If you are serious about the security of your data stored, shared, and processed in Microsoft OneDrive, and other applications like Exchange, SharePoint, and Microsoft Teams, you should give DPX vPlus a try.  

 

DPX vPlus is a Microsoft 365 backup and recovery solution for SharePoint, Exchange, OneDrive, and Teams. It provides the ability for granular backup and recovery of all aspects of the Microsoft 365 suite. This means that if a SharePoint item, email, contact, calendar item or file is accidentally deleted, modified, or lost, that data can be recovered to its original location, to an alternate user in the cloud, or downloaded locally. A modern, web-based user interface makes administration and backup scheduling simple and efficient. Deduplication, compression and encryption (in transit and at rest), ensures that your data is not only protected, but limits storage requirements and provides a scalable architecture. 

 

If you would like to learn more about DPX vPlus for Microsoft 365, you can request a live demo or even get a 30-day trial copy to try it for yourself. You can also watch a pre-recorded demonstration of vPlus backup and recovery for Microsoft 365. We’ll be happy to help you set things up.  

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01/27/2023 0 Comments

Microsoft 365 – Why SharePoint Backup is Needed

SharePoint has been the go-to-service for organizations when it comes to managing large volumes of shared data in the cloud. The SharePoint platform makes sharing of documents amongst teams an easy process, especially since remote team-work has become the norm. Because of this, SharePoint oftentimes contains essential, business data, and this exposes a major gap in the SharePoint on-line platform: risk of data loss if you don’t do Microsoft 365 backups.  

 

Now, if you’ve ever experienced losing a document that wasn’t backed up, imagine how much worse it can be when an organization’s entire SharePoint site at risk! SharePoint does not provide any native backup and restoration features to protect the data contained in it. Data loss in SharePoint can be caused by a number of different factors, accidental or otherwise, including threats from inside and outside of your organization. This is why a SharePoint backup solution is a necessity. (You can click here to request a MS365 Backup demo)

 

How Microsoft 365 Protects Your Data 

Like the other applications in Microsoft 365, SharePoint does provide built-in data protection tools that may feel like SharePoint backup. Features like the Recycle Bin, and the ability to set up retention policies for deleted data can help you restore information that was inadvertently deleted. However, these features have limitations when files are not used on a regular basis and when they have been deleted for a longer period of time.  

 

Recycle Bin

When SharePoint files are deleted, they are moved to the Recycle Bin, where they are stored for 93 days. If an end user were to empty their personal Recycle Bin, the items are transferred to the second-stage Recycle Bin. The second-stage bin is hidden from the end user, only accessible by your Microsoft 365 administrator, and will retain the files for the remainder of the 93 days. Regardless of the Recycle Bin that holds the files, after the 93 days, the files will be purged and cannot be recovered by the administrator. Another important thing to consider is that files in Recycle Bins still count against storage quota. When your total volume of your data exceeds your storage quota, files are removed from the Recycle Bin in order to make space for new items. 

 

Retention Policies 

Retention policies including litigation holds, can be applied to an entire SharePoint site to prevent data deletion of any kind. As long as the hold policy is in effect, data in the site cannot be deleted by the user. However, this leaves a vulnerability where rogue administrators, or infected end users with privileged access can still delete items from a site. SharePoint does provide Retention Lock, which will ensure that no one can manipulate an existing retention policy. One thing to keep in mind when considering Retention Lock, is that enabling this feature is an irreversible action. While a site sit in the locked state and no data is being cleaned/deleted, storage space can quickly be consumed, requiring you to purchase additional storage space. 

 

As a SaaS solution, SharePoint functions using a “share responsibility” model when it comes to data protection. This essentially states that Microsoft is responsible for keeping the SharePoint application and the underlying infrastructure running, but Microsoft 365 subscribers are responsible for securing and backup up their own data. If an organization were to suffer a data loss event within the Microsoft 365 cloud, it is up to the organization, not Microsoft, to recover the lost data from their own Microsoft 365 backups 

 

Lack of Microsoft 365 Backup Leaves You Exposed 

As mentioned above, SharePoint is a great solution for sharing documents and other crucial information in a collaborative environment. However, since the data is available to be used, modified, and deleted by multiple remote end users, the data can be exposed to several different dangers. However, no matter how severe these dangers are, all of them can be dealt with by simply having a functional SharePoint backup ready to be rolled back in case a serious data loss occurs. Here are some of the worst dangers, which can easily be prevented with a SharePoint backup: 

 

Accidental Deletion 

Human error remains the leading cause of most data loss. A user may delete a file by accident, or perhaps overwrite good data with something that is incorrect. Since SharePoint is commonly used for team-related work and utilized by many different employees simultaneously, it is not unusual for data to shift places, or to be removed by someone once it becomes redundant or outdated.  

 

While Microsoft offers features like the Recycle Bin to restore recently deleted data, it is very common for files to be deleted, or data to be overwritten without anyone noticing. Also, data that was once deemed unnecessary, or outdated, may become relevant again in the future. However, restoring such data, which was deleted for a longer time period, is not possible in SharePoint unless you have a third party SharePoint backup in place. Even worse, this type of data is often removed in bulk, which can, in turn, lead to the unintended deletion of large amounts of important information. 

 

Malware/Ransomware 

Ransomware represents one of the single biggest threats to SharePoint data. Because data is accessed from several different endpoints, SharePoint is vulnerable to possible malware and ransomware attacks from external sources. If a user accidentally opens an infected link or a file with malware inside, they can infect all of the documents and information stored within SharePoint.  

Once ransomware infects a SharePoint site, it can spread to other files, causing them to become encrypted. If this happens, very little can be done to retrieve this data. However, utilizing an external and air-gapped SharePoint backup can be a simply way to restore the effected data back to a point-in-time before the attack occurred.  

 

Internal Threats 

Malicious threats of data loss don’t always come from outside the organization. A disgruntled employee, or administrator may take it upon themselves to delete large amounts of data before leaving the organization. They may also empty the Recycle Bin or modify existing retention policies which can make recovery of the data very difficult. Having a SharePoint backup solution with file-level recovery capabilities can easily recover those files to the original location, or even migrate that data to a new owner or a new SharePoint site.  

 

Effective SharePoint Backup and Recovery 

SharePoint, as well as the rest of the applications making up the Microsoft 365 suite, provides great value for organizations, especially those working collaboratively from various locations and endpoints. However, Microsoft leaves end users vulnerable to data loss because its native data protection features do not fully protect you from all data loss scenarios. With that in mind, it is imperative that SharePoint users, and Microsoft 365 users in general, utilize a third-party backup solution for those disaster recovery and day-to-day recovery situations.  

 

That is where DPX vPlus comes in. DPX vPlus is a Microsoft 365 backup and recovery solution for SharePoint, Exchange, OneDrive, and Teams. It provides the ability for granular backup and recovery of all aspects of the Microsoft 365 suite. This means that if a SharePoint item, email, contact, calendar item or file is accidentally deleted, modified, or lost, that data can be recovered to its original location, to an alternate user in the cloud, or downloaded locally. A modern, web-based user interface makes administration and backup scheduling simple and efficient. Deduplication, compression and encryption (in transit and at rest), ensures that your data is not only protected, but limits storage requirements and provides a scalable architecture. 

 

If you would like to learn more about DPX vPlus for Microsoft 365 backup, you can request a live demo or even get a 30-day trial copy to try it for yourself. You can also watch a pre-recorded demonstration of vPlus backup and recovery for Microsoft 365. We’ll be happy to help you set things up.  

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01/19/2023 0 Comments

DPX vPlus 5.2 Expands Cloud Backup Coverage to Azure and Google Clouds

We are pleased to announce the latest release of Catalogic DPX vPlus, that expands cloud backup coverage and provides Microsoft 365 backup enhancements to provide unparalleled flexibility in designing and implementing data protection strategies. Known for its robust integration capabilities, DPX vPlus supports backup and recovery for dozens of virtual environments, containers, cloud environments, storage providers and applications.

In previous releases, DPX vPlus for Open VMs customers gained AWS EC2 backup and vPlus 5.2 continues this focus on cloud backup by supporting for Azure backup and Google Cloud Platform (GCP) backup.

vPlus 5.2 also added support for Virtuozzo Hypervisor backup with the direct access via SSH (both full and incremental hypervisor backups are supported).

A few points about backup storage destinations: storage configuration customization during the restore feature is now available for KVM, Virtuozzo, and Huawei Fusion Compute station. Also, incremental backup capability for the OpenStack environments has been added, and it is also supported in the Disk Attachment backup strategy with just cinder being used.

If you are using DPX vPlus for Microsoft 365 backup, there are some improvements for you too. Microsoft 365 users now have the option to restore contacts and calendars in vCard and iCalc formats. Also, you may have noticed that Microsoft recently updated their Teams API which caused some connection issues with earlier versions of vPlus. This is no longer the case, as this has been fixed.

vPlus 5.2 also introduces a new CLI which supports new syntax and bash completion – it is available side by side with the old one, as a technical preview, until it is finalized in the next release.

And last but not least, vPlus 5.2 added support for CentOS Stream 9 as the supported OS on which you can deploy DPX vPlus.

A full list of the new vPlus backup features and improvements are found below:

Virtual Environments Backup and Recovery

  • Virtuozzo Hypervisor
  • Azure Cloud
  • Google Cloud Platform (GCP)
  • Installation on RHEL/Centos Stream 9
  • Storage customization during restore for KVM (standalone), Virtuozzo and Huawei FusionCompute
  • Support for Red Hat OpenShift API for Data Protection (OADP)
  • OpenStack incremental backup using Disk Attachment (cinder) strategy
  • Restore individual disk to datastore (Citrix, Hyper-V, Nutanix AHV)

DPX vPlus User Interface Improvements

  • Backup/restore transfer rate charts
  • Command line interface (CLI) v2 – technical preview
  • Multi-select filter for virtual machines list
  • Restore window using a wizard
  • Initial configuration wizard enhancements
  • Support for Polish Language in WebUI 

Microsoft 365  Backup Improvements

  • Download contacts and calendars in vCard and iCalc format
  • Support for Microsoft Teams API
  • Major performance improvements in task processing

Other vPlus Backup Improvements

  • Mandatory cleanup of the import directory from a staging area
  • Option to define schedules and policies with the same name

Summary

DPX vPlus continues to introduce useful features that truly improve data protection processes, automate backup and restore tasks, and ensure the highest standards of reliability.  No matter if you manage virtual environments based on open, commercial, or mixed solutions, Azure or GCP, or Microsoft 365 data, vPlus supports all of them under one backup license.

For further information on vPlus, take a look at the resources on our vPlus product page. Customers with support can access more detailed information on release notes on the Support page.  If you want to give vPlus a try, want to see a live demo, or have a question about the product, Contact us today!

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12/21/2022 0 Comments

DPX 4.9 Adds Proactive Ransomware Shield for Linux and Improves Quality of Alerts for Backup Admins

We are pleased to announce the release of Catalogic DPX 4.9, where we continue to build upon our commitment to providing one of the most cyber resilient data protection and backup coverage matrices for private, public, and hybrid-cloud environments. This release adds to our industry leading ransomware recovery and cyber resilience features by building on the DPX GuardMode for Windows capability made available in DPX 4.8.1.

GuardMode provides proactive monitoring for early detection and notification of suspicious activity along with identifying and enabling the recovery of any affected data. Before DPX 4.9, this feature was limited to Windows, but DPX 4.9 now offers GuardMode for Linux servers and Samba shares.  In addition, backup administrators can now benefit from increased quality of alerts, where GuardMode measures the level of file entropy and compares known magic signatures on files suspected to be impacted. GuardMode uses active, live forensic techniques instead of analyzing backup data that lags security incidents by several hours, days, and even weeks.

DPX 4.9 also delivered improvements to the web-based HTML UI, including support for Block Backup, Restore, and support for archival of those block-based backups. We also added several improvements to different DPX services, including reporting and event service monitoring.

We have also added several improvements to the use of DPX vStor in this release. This includes the ability to archive backup copies from a replicated vStor, multi-factor authentication, and an easier way to install vStor on a physical server.

And finally, DPX 4.9 includes many general improvements to existing DPX features. All new features of our DPX 4.9 product are listed below:

DPX Cyber Resilience

  • GuardMode for Linux

Adds a Linux ransomware detection agent with the ability to detect and notify an administrator of possible suspicious activity on the host. This is an upgrade to the already present Windows agent that adds a layer of ransomware detection and alerting to the DPX enterprise.

  • Encrypted Files Detection and Encryption Tracking

Adds an agent feature that detects encrypted files and tracks the encryption process to provide a list of affected files through a REST API. This allows administrators to improve their understanding of the infection scope as well as provides a list of affected files to restore.

  • Syslog Support

Adds syslog as a notification target for notifications.  This allows administrators to plug in GuardMode agent notifications into their existing security event collection workflows (for example, into a SIEM solution.)

DPX Services

  • Support for Block Backup and Restore in HTML UI

Adds the option of scheduling Block Backups and all corresponding restore options (File Restore, Instant Access Mapping, Backup Virtualization, Application) to HTML UI.  Now, the user can run block backup and restore workloads without relying on the Java GUI by using the HTML UI or REST API, which is faster and opens up new automation or integrations possibility.

  • Support for Double Protection for Block Backup

Adds option of Double Protection in the HTML UI. The Administrator can now configure Double Protection (Archiving) via the HTML UI more responsively and intuitively. REST APIs are available for this feature as well.

  • Reporting Improvements

Adds the ability to generate PDF versions of the reports, scheduling of reports, and the option to send them via email. Also introduces a new report for 24-hour job status overview.

  • Event Service Improvements

Adds more Master Server events to be received by the DPX event service. This allows an administrator to configure granular email notifications for more types of events from DPX services, including backup jobs, status changes and more.

  • Appliance Operating System Update to Alma Linux 8.7

Migrated the appliance operating system to a downstream Linux distribution from Red Hat and upgraded to a current release.

DPX Core 

  • Archive from Alternate/Replicated DPX vStor

Adds the ability to archive from a replicated vStor.  This allows the Administrator the flexibility to configure backup to a primary DPX vStor at a branch office then replicate to a central site vStor, and to also archive data from the secondary vStor to Cloud/Tape/DiskDirectory, and then restore to any location.

  • Microsoft Azure Blob and Alibaba Object Storage support

Adds Microsoft Azure Blob and Alibaba Object Storage support as Archive/NDMP cloud targets.

  • Catalog Condense Improvements

Catalog Condense now cleans up Cloud and DiskDirectory storage.

  • Integrating DPX Core Services to Linux systemd Service Manager

Uses systemd to manage cmagent/nibbler services on RedHat/CentOS 7.6+ and SUSE 12+.

  • Adding New Platforms for Agentless VMware Backup Proxies

Support RHEL, CentOS, OEL, and AlmaLinux 8.0~8.3 as proxy nodes for Agentless VMware backup.

  • New BMR ISO for Linux kernel v4.18

New Linux BMR ISO to support Linux kernel v4.18.

DPX vStor – Software-Defined Backup Appliance

  • Addition of MFA

Adds a Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) to both UI and console access.

  • Password Reset Improvements

Adds the ability to reset password on HTML UI.

  • Physical Installation ISO

Creates ISO installation image that can be used to install vStor on physical appliances.

Summary

For further information on DPX 4.9, see the What’s New in DPX 4.9 document and other resources on the DPX products page. Customers with support can access more detailed information in the release notes on the Support page.  For more information on Microsoft 365 and Open VM backups, please see DPX vPlus.

Whether it is ransomware attacks, human error or IT outages, every business needs an affordable and reliable data protection solution like Catalogic DPX to backup and instantly recover data to ensure business continuity. Have a question or want a live demo? Contact us today!

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12/14/2022 0 Comments

Backup and Restore for Multi-Hypervisor Environments

As container technology and Kubernetes, specifically, continues to be considered the future of virtualization, the fact is that the traditional hypervisor market continues to grow. According to Maximize Market Research, by 2027 the hypervisor market is expected to reach a value of $4.45 Billion, a CAGR (Compound annual growth rate) of 29.78% from 2020. As has been the case for a decade, VMware continues to be the leader in market share, at 56.8% (a number that is down from 65.4% in 2008). Still, an interesting trend is beginning to take shape: increasingly, small and midsize organizations are leaving VMware’s high costs behind and are transitioning to several alternative open VM platforms. 

Diversifying Hypervisor Environments 

As these alternative hypervisors continue to develop and become more “enterprise ready,” many organizations find themselves with virtual environments consisting of multiple different hypervisors. There are many reasons why organizations may choose to diversify their virtual environments across different and open hypervisors: 

  • Limit the cost of “enterprise” hypervisors like VMware, Hyper-V, and Amazon EC2 by hosting lower-priority workloads on open VM options. 
  • Integration limitations for backup software and other applications. 
  • Test servers, sandbox environments, and offline servers can be run on open VM alternatives. 
  • End-user preferences – KVM vs. Red Hat framework, Windows vs. Linux OS, etc.  

Backup for Multi-Hypervisor and Open VM Environments 

One of the difficulties for these diverse environments is ensuring that data across these multiple virtual environments are protected and available for quick recovery after a disaster. Most legacy data protection solutions on the market narrow the focus of their solutions to a few of the more popular hypervisors. This limitation often causes end-users to hesitate to store stateful workloads on these unsupported hypervisors or prevents them from taking advantage of more cost-effective alternatives altogether. With DPX vPlus, however, open VM backups are not an issue. 

DPX vPlus for Open VMs provides a trustworthy and convenient backup and restore solution for companies that enrich their infrastructure with multiple virtualization platforms. With the versatility of both DPX and DPX vPlus, businesses don’t need to worry looking for a new backup solution for their commercial workloads that use open hypervisors like KVM, RHEV/RHV, oVirt, PowerKVM, and Proxmox, or their edge computing solutions like Scale Computing.  From a single pane of glass, DPX vPlus users can backup and restore open VMs from all these and more open hypervisors using on-demand jobs and scheduled backup/recovery SLAs. 

Summary 

Until recently, companies were hesitant to rely on alternative hypervisors for their production/stateful workloads, especially across multiple virtual environments.  The uneasiness of trusting an unknown, open-source VM option prevented end users from taking advantage of the benefits of a heterogeneous virtual environment. But as the need for flexibility grows and the cost for hypervisors like VMware and Hyper-V continue to rise, more companies are taking the open VM platform leap. 

We understand that every server virtualization platform has its pros and cons. DPX vPlus for Open VMs allows end users to take advantage of the pros of multiple open VMs or hypervisors by providing a centralized data protection system for heterogeneous virtual environments.   

If you would like to learn more about DPX vPlus for Open VMs, you can request a live demo or even get a 30-day trial copy to try it yourself. You can also watch the below pre-recorded demonstration of DPX vPlus backup and recovery for Open VMs.  We’ll be happy to help you set things up. 

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11/23/2022 0 Comments

Protect Your Microsoft 365 Data with DPX vPlus

We live in a world where data is the new oil. Not only is data valuable for you to maintain and run your business, but if you do not have a plan for data backup and recovery, we can end up paying a high price for it. According to a study by Touche Ross, 90% of businesses without a disaster recovery plan, will fail after a disaster.  Meanwhile, more and more critical organizational data is being created, stored, and shared outside of the data center. Oftentimes, this is close to or over 50% of organizational data.  This data lives on laptops, tablets, mobile devices and in cloud services, like Microsoft 365.  And yet this data can very easily be lost and lost for good without proper Microsoft 365 backup.

Being a SaaS productivity app, Microsoft 365 makes a lot of sense in today’s mobile world.  Easy access to documents through the cloud, improved collaboration on project using SharePoint and Teams, and its overall flexibility are just a few of the reasons why adoption of Microsoft 365 continues to rise year after year.  However, many organizations believe that moving data to a cloud-based SaaS solution means that data backup is no longer needed – that the provider takes on the responsibility to protect the data.  According to a recent Enterprise Strategy Group report, one in four businesses don’t believe they need Microsoft 365 backup.  But this is simply not the case, including Sharepoint backup and OneDrive backup.

Microsoft provides what some describe as marginal efforts to protect and backup data, but it does not guarantee complete and fast restores of deleted or corrupted Microsoft 365 data. To put it simply, Microsoft ensures that it won’t lose your data.  However, the company doesn’t make any guarantees about recovering it for you. This means that the majority of the burden is placed on the customer.

Now if Microsoft 365 ensures that it won’t lose your data, you may be asking why you would ever need to worry about recovering your data?  The answer is that Microsoft’s promises are limited to protection against loss of service due to hardware failure or natural disaster, and short-term protection following user- or admin-error.  This means that there are several examples where data loss can occur outside these two areas.

  1. Recovering an email or file that was deleted a long time ago:  Microsoft has a 93-day retention policy for both its first and second recycling bins.  This means that if a file or email has been deleted for more than 93 days, this file is permanently deleted from that recycling bin and cannot be recovered by Microsoft.
  2. Human Error: This can include any actions like accidently or intentionally deleting important emails or files.  Perhaps an employee leaves the company and deletes the contents of his/her mail, attachments, documents, etc.  This is especially important when using OneDrive.  If a user deletes or modifies a file on their local device, that change, or deletion, is automatically synced with all connected devices.
  3. Ransomware or Malware Attacks: A malware infection, or a ransomware attack can lead to encryption or deletion of your data in Microsoft 365.

With all that in mind, it is essential that you have a third-party Microsoft 365 backup provider to protect against accidental or malicious file deletion, other user errors, ransomware, and data corruption.  That is where DPX vPlus for Microsoft 365 backup comes in. Watch this short pre-recorded demonstration of how DPX vPlus provides Microsoft 365 backup and recovery, including Sharepoint backup and Teams backup

DPX vPlus is a Microsoft 365 backup and recovery solution for SharePoint, Exchange, OneDrive, and Teams.  It provides the ability for granular backup and recovery of all aspects of the Microsoft 365 suite.  This means that if an email, contact, calendar item or file is accidentally deleted, modified, or lost, that data can be recovered to its original location, to an alternate user in the cloud, or downloaded locally.  A modern, web-based user interface makes administration and backup scheduling simple and efficient.  Deduplication, compression and encryption (in transit and at rest), ensures that your data is not only protected, but limits storage requirements and provides a scalable architecture.  When it comes to storage of the backup data, vPlus offers two options.  First, a customer can back up to a local file system on the vPlus appliance, or a mounted CIFS or NFS share.  Or, if you prefer to keep the cloud data in the cloud, vPlus can even store their Microsoft 365 backup data in an object storage destination like, Azure Blob or AWS S3.

If you would like to learn more about DPX vPlus for Microsoft 365, you can request a live demo or even get a 30-day trial copy to try it for yourself. We’ll be happy to help you set things up. 

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09/20/2022 0 Comments