Dell highlights clean cyber recovery imperative

Clean cyber recovery is becoming a critical focus for Indian enterprises as cyber threats such as ransomware, data corruption, and supply-chain attacks grow more sophisticated and damaging. A newly released joint whitepaper highlights why traditional backup and disaster recovery approaches are no longer sufficient in today’s threat environment.

The paper argues that organisations must be able to restore operations from data that is isolated, trusted, and provably uncorrupted. Recovery, it notes, has moved beyond a purely technical concern and must now be treated as a core business continuity requirement.

Detection has advanced; recovery has not

According to the whitepaper, many organisations face a widening cyber maturity gap. While detection and prevention capabilities have improved significantly, recovery strategies have not kept pace with the realities of modern cyber incidents.

Venkat Sitaram, Senior Director and Country Leader, ISG Solutions, Dell Technologies India, said that in several incidents the main challenge is no longer stopping an attack, but identifying a clean and trusted copy of data to restart business operations. He noted that clean cyber recovery, built on isolation, immutability, and intelligence, has emerged as the last line of defence when preventive controls fail.

Aligning recovery with established frameworks

The paper examines how enterprises can strengthen cyber resilience by aligning recovery strategies with the NIST Cybersecurity Framework, particularly its Respond and Recover functions. It stresses that recovery planning should not be treated as an IT afterthought but integrated into broader governance and risk management structures.

The whitepaper positions recovery readiness as a board-level concern, especially for organisations operating critical infrastructure or handling sensitive data.

Three foundational shifts for clean cyber recovery

The whitepaper outlines three key structural changes required for enterprises and operators of critical infrastructure to enable clean cyber recovery.

The first shift is moving from connected backups to isolated cyber vaults. Air-gapped vaults with independent networks and credentials are designed to ensure recovery data remains protected even if production environments and identity systems are compromised.

The second shift involves moving from basic data retention to regulatory-grade immutability. Immutability controls enforced through dual authorisation, protected time settings, and detailed audit trails prevent even privileged users from altering or deleting critical data. The paper describes this as essential for regulated and mission-critical environments.

The third shift focuses on progressing from simple anomaly alerts to content-level integrity analytics. Deep analysis of data content, beyond metadata checks, helps organisations identify the last known-good recovery point and restore systems without reintroducing hidden corruption or malware.

Recovery confidence defines cyber resilience

According to Prof NK Goyal, President, Cyber Security Association of India, cyber resilience should now be defined by how confidently an organisation can recover, not just how quickly it can detect an incident. He said clean cyber recovery brings technology, governance, and policy together to ensure businesses can be restored from data that is trusted, immutable, and forensically sound.

He added that this capability is critical for India’s digital economy and for sectors that underpin essential national services.

Towards a recovery-first security posture

By aligning architectural best practices with the NIST Cybersecurity Framework and other global security standards, the initiative encourages enterprises to adopt a recovery-first security posture. This approach combines zero-trust principles, isolated cyber vaults, strong governance mechanisms, and deep data integrity validation.

As cyber threats continue to escalate, the paper concludes that resilience is no longer measured by whether data is backed up. The real test is whether organisations can restore operations from a clean, uncompromised foundation.