Good news awaits any organization looking for an online software-as-a-service (SaaS) solution to back up its Microsoft 365 Online data. Most Microsoft 365 SaaS backup solutions equip organizations to protect data residing in Microsoft 365’s core offerings. These include Exchange, OneDrive, and SharePoint. As a result, almost any Microsoft 365 SaaS backup solution will meet an organization’s basic Microsoft 365 backup needs.
However, for the same monthly price, organizations can now get more bang for their backup buck. The latest Microsoft 365 SaaS backup solutions offer more comprehensive and powerful Microsoft 365 backup features. While they back up the core Microsoft 365 components, they include new features to better meet emerging organizational needs. These include Microsoft Teams data backup, continuous backup of Microsoft 365 data, and better protection against ransomware attacks.
Microsoft Teams Data Backup
The rapid adoption of Microsoft Teams by all size organizations directly coincides with the COVID-19 pandemic. As of April 2019, Microsoft Teams had about 15 million users. By September 2020, the number of Microsoft Teams users exploded to more than 115 million. Further, most of this adoption occurred during 2020 as the pandemic took hold.
Microsoft Teams’ swift adoption by organizations caught SaaS backup providers somewhat unprepared. While they have made progress, as of early 2021 only about half of SaaS providers back up Microsoft Teams data. Even among those solutions that do back up Microsoft Teams, they backup Microsoft Teams data differently.
Microsoft Teams Backup Differences
The SaaS backup solutions that protect Microsoft Teams usually back up all data residing in Microsoft Teams Group channels. The Microsoft Teams Group channel chats or conversations, documents, and Wikis each generate data. Microsoft Teams stores this Group data in SharePoint Online. The SaaS backup solutions capitalize on their existing integration with SharePoint to access and back up Microsoft Teams Group data.
Differences between SaaS backup solutions largely emerge in their ability to protect data in private channels. Microsoft Teams stores private data in the personal OneDrive for Business folder associated with the individual initiating the chat. Only a few SaaS backup solutions back up and recover data for Microsoft Teams’ private channels. Organizations needing to back up their Microsoft Teams private channels’ data must validate the SaaS backup solution offers this level of protection.
Organizations will find Microsoft 365 SaaS backup solutions typically include Microsoft Teams data backup as a core product feature. Once organizations identify a solution that backs up their Microsoft Teams data, expect the feature to include this functionality.
Continuous Microsoft 365 Data Backup
Organizations often encounter limitations on how frequently they can schedule Microsoft 365 backups. All SaaS backup solutions, regardless of the provider, usually only give organizations a few options to schedule backups.
Most minimally permit organizations to manually initiate a backup at any time and perform once-a-day backups. Some even offer the option to schedule two or three backups per day.
Unfortunately, these options do not give organizations the option to set specific times for backups to occur. For example, scheduling a backup once-a-day means the backup may occur anytime during a 24-hour day. If scheduling twice-a-day backups, each backup could occur anytime during each 12-hour window. This backup scheduling randomness potentially leaves some data unprotected between backups.
Closing the Backup Gap
This gap in Microsoft 365 data protection stemmed from the lack of available APIs in Microsoft Graph. Developers use Microsoft’s Graph APIs to access, retrieve, and restore data and information to and from Microsoft 365. Until recently, SaaS backup providers lacked the technical means to perform more frequent, granular Microsoft 365 backups.
This situation changed in 2020. Microsoft introduced new Graph API calls to equip programmers to track changes in Microsoft 365.
Using these APIs, backup solutions could monitor and receive change notifications on Outlook calendar events, contacts, and messages. They could also get notified when Microsoft Teams conversations occurred or when activity occurred on any OneDrive content.
In short, backup solutions can finally backup Microsoft 365 more frequently, more granularly, and without disruption. Already a few Microsoft SaaS backup solutions offer this functionality. Using these new APIs, they monitor for changes to Microsoft 365 and continuously back data up as changes occur.
Due to the recent introduction of this feature, organizations will only find continuous backup available on a few backup solutions. They will primarily find it from newer SaaS backup providers who introduced their solution in the last few years.
On the upside, expect more Microsoft 365 SaaS backup providers to introduce changed data tracking in the coming years. Further, expect them to make this feature available as a core product offering and include it at no extra charge.
Anti-ransomware Capabilities
Ransomware represents one of the most prominent threats to any organization’s application and data availability. New ransomware threats emerge daily with it finding ever more insidious ways to enter organizations and encrypt data. Frequently, ransomware comes into organizations through email attachments, links, and phony email addresses.
Microsoft 365 includes Exchange Online Protection (EOP) that offers inbound and outbound filtering for malware such as ransomware. This protection extends to SharePoint Online to automatically protect files uploaded and saved to document files. Its service checks hourly for new malware definitions from multiple Microsoft partners. It uses heuristic scanning to check for both known (signature match) and unknown (suspicious) malware.
Despite Microsoft 365’s native, robust malware protection, ransomware still gets through its defenses. Once it does, ransomware becomes an organization’s responsibility to detect, remove, and recover from it. Microsoft 365 SaaS backup solutions may offer one or more options to assist organizations in this endeavor.
Immutable Storage
This represents one of the most common options available to organizations to protect their backup data. Once ransomware attacks, multiple ransomware strains seek out and delete or encrypt backup data as well as production data.
Even backup data stored and managed by the backup software is not necessarily secure. Should the ransomware gain some form of administrative permissions to the backup software itself, it could compromise the backup data.
To prevent this occurrence, multiple Microsoft 365 SaaS backup solutions make the backup data immutable. While most backup solutions store backup data in cloud object stores, that does not automatically make it unchangeable.
To make it immutable, they also utilize cloud storage’s object locking feature. This makes backups impermeable to deletion or encryption. Some solutions even go so far as to introduce air gaps so ransomware cannot even access the backup data. This helps prevent ransomware from copying backup data off-site so hackers cannot resell the data or release it publicly.
Ransomware Detection and Remediation
Some Microsoft 365 SaaS backup solutions work in conjunction with Microsoft 365’s native anti-ransomware capabilities. They again scan and analyze emails and files that slip through Microsoft 365’s filters. They also monitor for other activities such as abnormal data downloads and data migrations. They also monitor user logins that may occur outside of their normal operating times.
Despite all these security measures, ransomware attacks still occur. In this event, one solution helps organizations avoid mass encryption by automatically locking the user’s account and data. It then expedites recoveries by scanning for and identifying encrypted files and granularly recovering only the damaged files. This reduces downtime caused by ransomware while minimizing the need to recover mass amounts of data.
Another solution uses Microsoft 365’s new changed data tracking feature to accelerate recoveries after a ransomware attack. Since it tracks every change, organizations can recover data right up to the moment before when the ransomware attack started. It also helps prevent unauthorized data deletions, modifications, or access. Many organizations configure the solution to require two individuals to perform these types of activities.
Spear Phishing
Another form of malware uses spear phishing to access corporate data. Hackers send emails to specific, well-researched targets appearing as a trusted sender. The recipient opens the email and acts upon the email’s content, thereby potentially infecting their data or even sending money.
To counter this form of malware, some SaaS backup providers deliver hybrid backup and security solutions. The solution’s security component analyzes past emails from that individual. It then compares it to the current one to determine the sender’s authenticity. Should it detect aberrations in the email’s wording and the sender’s focus, it generates an alert.
More Bang for Your Backup Buck
Any organization will find it relatively easy to find an effective SaaS backup solution for their Microsoft 365 data. Identifying one that delivers them the latest and greatest features with minimal or no extra cost takes a little more effort.
Those organizations which invest the extra time will get some extra backup power for the same backup buck. These solutions equip them to back up their Microsoft Teams data, continuously back up all their Microsoft 365 data, and better protect themselves against ransomware attacks.
To obtain these features, look to backup solutions from some of the newest providers on the market. These newer solutions generally deliver all the core backup features organizations need plus the next generation features they seek.
