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VMblog Expert Interview: Topher Tebow of Acronis Reveals Findings from their 2020 MSP Cybersecurity Readiness Survey

interview-acronis-tebow 

Acronis recently announced findings from its 2020 MSP Cybersecurity Readiness Survey. The primary research effort was conducted by Omdia (formerly Ovum) and explored the current and future capabilities for managed security and backup/recovery among managed service providers in the US and the UK. The survey also examined the biggest business and technical obstacles to MSPs' ability to execute.

To find out more, VMblog reached out to Topher Tebow, cybersecurity analyst at Acronis.

VMblog:  Acronis recently conducted an independent study.  What does the study cover and why was this data important to discover?

Topher Tebow: The purpose of the research was to examine the current and planned offerings that MSPs have for backup/recovery as well as cybersecurity, and to better understand the business, organizational, and technical obstacles they face when executing those plans. Some of things we wanted to verify which were borne out in the data, included the fact most MSPs rely on a patchwork of legacy backup and security solutions. For example, MSPs often have different solutions for backup, anti-malware, configuration management, patch automation, remote desktop, and so on. This complexity gets expensive for MSPs to operate and complicates their licensing, pricing, deployments, testing, training, support workflows, and vendor contracting.

Naturally, we also wanted to understand how the recently launched Acronis Cyber Protect Cloud could address the key market needs and opportunities identified in the survey.

VMblog:  How many people did the study survey and what were their demographics?

Tebow: We received 263 responses, a little over 60% were from the US and the rest from the UK. The respondents to our survey had to be executives or decision makers at the organization. 13% of the MSPs in the study had less than 5 employees. 33% had between 5 and 50 employees and 54% had more than 50 employees.

VMblog:  What were the most important findings from the study?

Tebow: First, MSPs' customers are demanding security services and in order to stay relevant, let alone grow in today's market, MSPs need to offer a range of managed security services. Over 50% of MSPs list security as a top new service requested by their customers. However, 92% of MSPs indicated that acquiring the skills and expertise needed to deliver security services is a major obstacle to execution and 92% also indicated that they were unable to keep up to date with the rapidly changing threat landscape. So MSPs really feel the pressure to evolve into MSSPs but are facing incredibly difficult challenges putting the right people and process resources into place.

VMblog:  What are some of the biggest revelations that were uncovered by this research?

Tebow: The research was organized into three main sections, and I'll briefly cover the key results in each section. The first section was about the most important capabilities currently offered and planned for the next 12 months in terms of security services. The most important current capabilities included the ability to ensure minimal data loss or corruption in the event of an attack (86%), the rapid mitigation for discovered cyberthreats (86%), and a service that secures endpoints beyond anti-virus and anti-ransomware (85%). However, the biggest delta between current and planned capabilities came from security endpoints, indicating this is the area MSPs will be investing the most in over the next year.

The second section was about the important capabilities currently offered and planned for the next 12 months in terms of backup/recovery services. The most important current capability was the ability to automate the backup process (89%). However, the biggest delta between current and planned capabilities focused on providing rapid RTO and RPO (recovery time objective and recovery point objective) which indicates MSPs will be investing in tools and technologies to help them move faster. This is directly related to the need for better automation.

Finally, the last section focused on the business and technical obstacles to execution. As I already mentioned, the shortage in skills was the headline here. It is also worth noting that 83% of MSPs indicated they were struggling to manage too many vendors while 87% were having a hard time making a business case for developing managed security services which suggests they don't have the right solutions or commercial terms in place to package and price effectively.

VMblog:  What interested you the most about the findings and why?

Tebow: There were a lot of important findings but two related findings that really stood out were the desire to offer better endpoint security and the challenges managing too many vendors. Acronis provides one of the most powerful combinations of endpoint protection technologies available on the market, including anti-virus, anti-ransomware, anti-cryptojacking, patch management, URL filtering, and hard drive failure prediction. One of the fundamental value propositions of Acronis Cyber Protect Cloud is the ability to eliminate the complexity of juggling multiple vendor contracts and solutions.

VMblog:  After everything you've learned from this survey, what's next for Acronis?  How do you respond to the challenges found within the survey?

Tebow: The research results were incredibly validating for Acronis in terms of the message we are bringing to MSPs and the benefits that Acronis Cyber Protect Cloud brings. We need to continue to educate the channel on the importance of cyber protection - the integration of backup/recovery with cybersecurity, and we need to make sure MSPs understand Acronis is the right vendor to help them evolve beyond a traditional MSP in order to stay relevant and keep growing.

VMblog:  Finally, where can readers go to learn more about the survey results?

Tebow: We are actually hosting a webinar this Thursday, June 11th at 12:30pm EST with the lead Omdia analysts to help MSPs understand the results and better prepare for future challenges.

You can read and download the full report.

Published Tuesday, June 09, 2020 10:36 AM by David Marshall
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Acronis Releases Hardened Backup Solution Specifically Designed to Meet the Unique Needs of Air-Gapped Networks : @VMblog - (Author's Link) - August 5, 2020 9:35 AM
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