Due to its explosive growth, the management and storage of unstructured data is becoming increasingly challenging for organizations to contend with. This unprecedented expansion, however, is a double-edged sword: while the opportunities for leveraging this treasure trove abound, so do the issues in orchestrating it. Another major factor impacting data management, is that according to Gartner, by 2025, 75% of enterprise data will be created and processed at the edge - outside traditional centralized data centers or clouds. Today, companies across the globe are grappling with an increasing array of data-related problems, from cyber threats and compliance headaches, to the intricacies of data sovereignty.
Navigating cybersecurity challenges in 2024: a closer look
At the forefront of cybersecurity concerns is data sovereignty. Despite major cloud providers’ best efforts to align with strict regulations such as NIS2, ISO 27001, and GDPR, the landscape remains fraught with complexities. For many organizations handling sensitive data, depending on cloud service providers inherently comes with a myriad of hurdles, particularly concerning the location of data storage (whether it resides within or outside national borders) and the jurisdiction under which the company operates, with the Cloud Act being a major issue.
Data independence and control have never been more critical. The market is flooded with cloud storage solutions, yet, once data is integrated within these systems, transferring it to alternative environments — be it other clouds, data centers, or on-premises — becomes arduous, leading to potential vendor lock-ins that hinder innovative hybrid and multi-cloud strategies.
The threat landscape is also evolving. On the one hand, we're witnessing an uptick in regional disasters, ranging from data center fires to earthquakes, affecting service continuity. On the other, ransomware attacks are growing in sophistication, targeting both client-side and server-side vulnerabilities with unprecedented precision. For this reason, from the point of view of the user, a ransomware attack can be considered even worse than a natural disaster.
Cost considerations further complicate the scenario. Expansion efforts by cloud providers involving the construction of new physical sites not only exacerbate environmental and sustainability concerns, but also lead to spiraling costs. Additionally, the hidden fees imposed by some of the leading cloud storage providers — for egress, 90-day deletion policies, redundancy, and more — make cost predictability a considerable challenge. Often, these supplementary charges can equal or surpass the initial storage costs, effectively doubling the financial burden on organizations.
Centralized and distributed cloud: what’s new
At first glance, cloud solutions offered by hyperscalers might seem widely distributed. However, they often rely on a centralized infrastructure, with data housed within a few, albeit large, data centers.
Distributed cloud storage takes a fundamentally different approach by separating the control plane from the data itself. This facilitates data storage across multiple locations, both on-premises and across multiple cloud platforms, enhancing redundancy and resilience. This paradigm shift is game-changing for several reasons. Not only does it eliminate many traditional barriers and paves the way for more robust multi-cloud strategies, it also raises flexibility and resilience in data storage and management to a whole new level. Under this model, while the service provider maintains control over the control plane, the actual computing resources can be deployed and moved flexibly by the organisation. Whether within a single public cloud ecosystem, over multiple cloud environments, or within a private data center, the essence of distributed cloud lies in its ubiquity.
Control and sovereignty, reimagined
One of the distributed cloud's paramount benefits is the unprecedented degree of control it offers. Indeed, the distributed model eradicates the common issue of vendor lock-in, while also allowing organizations to precisely dictate the geographical perimeter where their data resides. This could mean having parts of your data securely stored in France, Italy, Germany, or literally any place you want, offering unprecedented levels of redundancy while complying with data localization requirements. Beyond data sovereignty, distributed cloud storage facilitates comprehensive independence over all facets of data management, ensuring that organizations can comply with evolving regional, European, and global regulations without relinquishing control to third-party providers and hyperscalers.
The significance of this cannot be overstated, especially in regions where data governance and digital sovereignty are key. In this context, the distributed cloud uniquely meets the need for sovereignty, cost control, and policy management, offering a balanced compromise between the on-premises and public cloud models. It combines the control over IT infrastructure traditionally associated with on-premises storage with the scalability and flexibility of public cloud services.
Applications and benefits of the distributed cloud
Distributed cloud storage technology is versatile, supporting a wide array of use cases, from backup and disaster recovery to fostering collaboration and housing expansive data lakes for AI and machine learning endeavors. Its latest developments unlock unprecedented resiliency, through encryption, fragmentation, and replication across customizable storage networks, and empowering MSPs and enterprises alike to build and deploy their own hyper-resilient, sovereign, 100% S3 compatible object storage network in minutes, with full control over data, infrastructure, and costs.
For MSPs and VARs, this autonomy transforms them into independent object storage providers, enabling them to offer secure and compliant storage solutions, maintain direct customer relationships, and enjoy enhanced profit margin. Full customization also means that MSPs can craft tailor-made industry clouds designed to meet the specific requirements of the industries and regions in which their customers operate.
Enterprises, on the other hand, benefit from a hybrid model that combines the best aspects of cloud storage and on-premises solutions, minus the drawbacks.
The distributed cloud's ability to tailor storage networks to meet specific national compliance requirements such as GDPR, ISO 27001, and CCPA, further underscores its utility. Its architecture, designed to prevent any single point of failure, can ensure up to 15 nines of data durability and minimizes the risks of downtime and data breaches, making it particularly suited to scenarios where cybersecurity, digital sovereignty, and independence are mission-critical.
Lastly, this model optimises resources by reusing what is already present in the premises of companies and data centres. This extends the storage hardware's lifespan while reducing carbon footprint and electronic waste. This eco-friendly approach not only addresses environmental concerns but also aligns with the growing demand for sustainable IT solutions.
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