In the dawn of this data-driven age, data is growing extraordinarily in its variety and velocity across all environments – in the cloud, on-premises and even on employees’ laptops working from home. Given that latest estimates indicate that 7.5 septillion gigabytes of data are generated every single day in the datasphere, managing and protecting this data is a considerable issue. This has propelled the data protection and management industry to rethink the trajectory of businesses for next few years. Some the data trends that we see shaping the next decade are-

Shattering the myths around cloud data protection

The introduction to evolvement phase of the cloud has been a two-step journey so far. From experimenting with cloud architectures, at present, most enterprises have completely shifted to it. Now that people embraced the possibilities of cloud, the myth that data in cloud does not need protection is busted. As more businesses transition from building and managing their own data centers, data protection strategy for cloud environments is now even more critical considering the complexity of cloud architectures.

Moving forward, it’s not just about getting to the cloud or about what infrastructure to use; there’s going to be an increased focus on cloud data management and creating a Cloud-First strategy as it turns the cloud into a critical building block for data management – not just a storage target.

Endpoint security is in the limelight

The expansion of the mobile working has resulted in a vast footprint of corporate data residing outside the network and the proliferation of ransomware has added a potentially expensive level of complexity and risk to organizations.

With the threat landscape escalating, securing the huge amount of data sitting at the endpoint especially for IP driven companies is becoming more important than ever. As the threat landscape is only going to get more complicated, businesses must pay more attention to security, and endpoint security systems involving intelligence integrations, continuous monitoring, and response capabilities to detect, contain, and block attacks.

Applying AI and ML for data protection

Additionally, AI, ML and predictive analysis will be viewed from a different lens in the coming years from security perspective. AI and ML can provide ways to alter the way organizations gather, process, and protect data.

It is an imperative to track changing human behaviour proactively to help businesses identify security threats before any damage is caused. These technologies are ideal for threat detection as the world is now moving into the realm of advanced cybersecurity.

Boom in DPaaS market

With 2021 turning out to be a record-breaking year for data breaches, data breach protections are going to be a key consideration for many organizations as we head into the year 2022. Within the hybrid working sphere, business need to grow and evolve and so does the level of the services. There has been a marked development in organizations’ approach to their security strategy.

The need for data protection services on the cloud will be further be massive in the coming years owing to the widespread adoption of cloud computing and data centers. Cloud service providers are extensively using DPaaS for advanced data and network security for organizations and this trend will continue to rise.

According to IDC, DPaaS solutions will result in double-digital annual growth throughout the forecast period, with the market reaching $18.4 billion by 2025.

Data literacy in data management

Today’s hyper- connected digitally evolving environment demands a high level of data literacy across all operations in an organization.

The industry is changing, and clients expect service providers to add value throughout the process in the coming year. As organizational data continues to explode, the storing, cleansing, sharing, and migrating such volumes of data is critical. It can take years to examine digital evidence without a fast, efficient and scalable data management for eDiscovery.

Data is an immensely, untapped enterprise-wide corporate asset which is far from static. Every data-driven organization wants real time access to the most important data in their business. A data literate employee would know where the data come from, its accuracy and what does the data tell. To be data literate and make business sense of ever-growing data assets is key to the smooth functionality of everything.

— Anshuman Rai, Area VP, India and South Asia at Commvault.