Prabhu RamIn an era where cyber threats are becoming increasingly sophisticated, the intersection of cybersecurity, data protection, and cyber resilience has never been more crucial.
Most organizations believe that having backups means they are prepared for a cyberattack. The reality, however, is far more complex.
Cybercriminals are not just encrypting live data—they are now targeting backup environments to ensure that recovery is impossible. With cybercriminals now leveraging AI-powered attack strategies, the cost and consequences of cyber breaches have escalated dramatically. With breaches costing enterprises >$5Mn per incident and attackers often going undetected for nearly 277 days, organizations need a new approach to cyber resilience.
I recently sat down with Darren Thomson, Field Chief Technology Officer, EMEA & India (EMEAI) at Commvault, a company at the forefront of cyber resilience.
We discussed the evolving digital risk landscape, the critical gaps in recovery planning, and how enterprises can stay ahead of emerging threats.
A Career Rooted in Digital Risk
With over 33 years of experience in the technology industry, Darren has seen the evolution of digital risk management closely.
“Twenty years ago, disaster recovery was about preparing for physical catastrophes—what happens when an airplane lands on a building? Over time, the focus shifted towards cybersecurity. The last decade has been particularly transformative, with cyber insurance and risk assessment playing a crucial role in business continuity. The reality is, organizations are not prepared for recovery. We have good backups, disaster recovery (DR) plans, and security measures, but there is a massive gap in restoring critical application environments after an attack.”
Why Commvault? A Focus on Cyber Resilience
Darren joined Commvault with a mission to bridge the gap between security and backup, emphasizing that recovery is just as critical as prevention.
“For me, Commvault stood out because they understood that backup and recovery alone are not enough. We need proactive cyber resilience—technologies that are deeply integrated with data to detect anomalies, ensure recovery readiness, and enable secure testing without disrupting operations. Security tools operate at a layer of abstraction from the data. They scan for malware and analyze metadata, but they are not embedded within the data itself to predict failures,” he noted.
Commvault’s edge lies in its deep integration with workloads, allowing early detection of anomalies.
“If a file has remained unchanged for five years and is suddenly encrypted, that could signal ransomware activity. Instead of disrupting operations, Commvault flags anomalies for security teams to investigate,” Darren explained.
One standout innovation is Commvault’s Cleanroom technology, an infrastructure-as-code approach that allows enterprises to test recovery strategies without impacting production.
“Testing is a fundamental problem. Organizations are not testing their recovery plans properly because they cannot afford downtime. With cleanroom technology, we can build temporary test environments in the cloud, ensuring that businesses are truly prepared for cyber incidents.”
“This is how we move from just responding to attacks to predicting them. It is about shifting from cyber recovery to cyber resilience.”
AI-Driven Threats: The New Arms Race
AI is transforming both cyberattacks and cyber defense.
“Cybercriminals are not bound by regulations, so they adopt AI faster than enterprises. If businesses do not integrate AI-driven security, they will be outpaced in this arms race,” Darren warned.
This focus on cyber resilience is reflected in Commvault’s recent acquisitions and new solutions.
Commvault is addressing this with Cleanroom Recovery—a cloud-based infrastructure-as-code solution that allows organizations to restore data in a completely isolated environment, free from reinfection risks. This also enables enterprises to test their recovery plans without impacting production systems—a challenge many companies struggle with.
Additionally, Commvault’s Cloud Rewind solution, powered by Appranix, takes cyber recovery to a new level. Unlike traditional backups that restore only data, Cloud Rewind allows businesses to restore their entire cloud environment—applications, configurations, and infrastructure—to a pre-attack state in minutes.
In addition, Commvault has also expanded its capabilities in AWS and Google Cloud through its acquisition of Clumio, bringing air-gapped backups and malware-free recovery solutions to cloud environments.
Bridging the Cybersecurity-IT Divide: Breaking Down Silos
One of the biggest organizational challenges in cyber resilience is the disconnect between security and IT teams.
“Security and infrastructure professionals speak different languages. They have different skills and backgrounds, and that disconnect impacts cyber resilience. Companies need to bring these teams together, fostering collaboration to build holistic defence strategies.”
Commvault’s Cloud Rewind and Cleanroom Recovery solutions are designed to bridge this gap, enabling seamless coordination between security teams (CISOs) and IT teams (CIOs) by automating recovery, ensuring clean backups, and integrating security monitoring.
Final Thoughts: From Reaction to Resilience
The key takeaway from my conversation with Darren? Organizations must shift from a reactive to a proactive cybersecurity posture.
“For too long, cybersecurity has been reactive—we respond to attacks after they happen. Commvault is changing that by enabling businesses to anticipate threats, test recovery strategies effectively, and integrate AI-driven security.”
India presents unique opportunities due to its digital-first mindset and growing regulatory focus on cybersecurity.
“The shift towards proactive cyber resilience is happening. Indian enterprises are value-conscious. However, they are also increasingly recognizing that the cost of inaction is far greater than the cost of investment in cyber resilience. Enterprises in India are recognizing that cyber recovery is just as important as cybersecurity. With the right approach, India can become a leader in cyber resilience.”
Cyber resilience is no longer just a security measure—it is becoming a competitive differentiator. In industries where uptime and reliability are critical to customer trust and business continuity, resilience provides a tangible edge.
As Darren emphasized:
“Shift the narrative from ‘You must secure yourself because you will likely be breached’ to ‘We are a resilient enterprise—you can depend on us.’ That is an extreme competitive advantage.”
In a world where cyber threats are evolving rapidly, companies must rethink their approach to security—moving from defense to resilience, from reaction to prediction.
Commvault’s cloud-native solutions and automated recovery capabilities offer a robust foundation for enterprises to thrive in this new digital landscape.
