The RSA Conference (RSAC), the premier cybersecurity industry event, returns to San Francisco’s Moscone Center April 28-May 1, 2025, bringing together thousands of security professionals, vendors, and thought leaders from across the globe. This annual gathering serves as the definitive forum for the latest cybersecurity innovations, trends, and best practices, featuring hundreds of educational sessions, keynotes from industry luminaries, and an expansive expo floor showcasing cutting-edge security solutions. For organizations navigating today’s complex threat landscape, RSAC provides unparalleled networking opportunities, hands-on training, and essential insights to help bolster defense strategies against evolving cyber threats.
In an era where 96% of cyberattacks target backup storage and ransomware incidents continue to surge, innovative approaches to data protection have never been more critical. Ahead of RSA Conference 2025, VMblog spoke with Anthony Cusimano, Director of Solutions Marketing at Object First, about their mission to deliver ransomware-proof backup solutions for Veeam users. With their Ootbi (Out-of-the-Box-Immutability) technology and Zero Trust Data Resilience framework, Object First is tackling the growing sophistication of AI-driven attacks by focusing on what happens after a breach occurs.
Visitors to RSA can find Object First at Booth S-260 in Moscone South to learn more about their approach to immutable backup storage and enter to win Airpods Max headphones during their trivia sessions.
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VMblog: Give VMblog readers a quick overview of your company and its core mission in the cybersecurity space.
Anthony Cusimano: Our mission is to be the best storage for Veeam by delivering ransomware-proof solutions. We envision a world where no one has to pay a ransom for their encrypted data.
That’s why we created Ootbi – the best storage for Veeam. We did it by engineering ransomware-proof and immutable out-of-the-box backup storage that is secure, simple, and powerful.Ootbi by Object First is the only immutable storage solution that is tailor-made for Veeam users and follows the best security practices of Zero Trust Data Resilience. It can be racked, stacked, and powered in 15 minutes while providing unbeatable backup and recovery performance.
VMblog: Where can attendees find you at RSA 2025? What’s your booth number, and what kind of experience can visitors expect when they stop by?
Cusimano: Object First can be found at Booth S-260, Moscone South.
Booth Activities:
Play Trivia and enter to win Headphones Airpods Max!
Game Times:
Tuesday, April 29 | 12:00 PM & 3:00 PM
Wednesday, April 30 | 12:00 PM & 3:00 PMWinner Announcement: April 30 | 4:00 PM | Object First Booth S-260
Demos with Object First engineers.
VMblog: What is your message to RSA attendees coming out to the show this year?
Cusimano: The risks of ransomware and other cyberthreats to backup data is greater than ever, with 96% of attacks targeting backup storage. In a 2025 study conducted by Enterprise Strategy Group, 81% of IT professionals identifed immutable backup storage built on Zero Trust as the best defense against ransomware. Object First offers that best, last defense against ransomware for Veeam customers, and is bringing secure, simple and power immutable storage immutability to more customers than ever. Ootbi by Object First is now available for small to large enterprises, supporting use cases from 20 TB up to 7 PB. With our latest Consumption Model, launched at VeeamON 2025, we make it even easier for customers to get immutability out-of-the-box, with no upfront costs, no hardware refreshes to manage, and predictable monthly billing.
VMblog: What were your key learnings from 2024’s security landscape, and how have those insights shaped your solutions for 2025?
Cusimano: AI-driven ransomware attacks are on the rise with a growing focus on targeting backups, making immutability a foundational element of any data protection strategy. At the same time, credential compromise through social engineering, session hijacking, and other tactics is increasing, highlighting the need to shrink trust boundaries and adopt a Zero Trust security model. While cloud solutions offer many advantages, they are not a complete answer-recent attacks have shown that cloud targets can also be vulnerable. A 3 2 1 1 0 ( 3 copies of data, 2 different media, 1 of which is off-site, 1 of which is offline, with zero errors after backup validation) model that includes on-premises immutable backup appliances is essential, emphasizing a recovery-first architecture to ensure resilience in the face of modern threats.
VMblog: With AI being a major focus in cybersecurity, how is your company leveraging or addressing AI both as an opportunity and a potential threat vector?
Cusimano: AI is coming fast and being leveraged more and more in attacks. They are getting better at impersonations, grammar, and context, which makes them harder to pick out as threats. The best defense is to shrink your attack surface and implement a data recovery strategy that includes immutable backup storage supports a Zero Trust Data Resilience architecture.
VMblog: What sets your solution apart in today’s crowded cybersecurity marketplace?
Cusimano: We are the only backup storage solution purpose-built for Veeam that offers out-of-the-box immutability that supports Zero Trust Data Resilience. We assume breach, and ensure that no attacker has access to root, ensuring no one has access to destructive actions even if credentials are compromised. We deliver this highest level of data security in a simple, secure, and powerful solution to ensure full and rapid recovery.
VMblog: What role does zero trust play in your security strategy and solutions? How are you helping organizations implement zero trust effectively?
Cusimano: Zero Trust has historically been applied to an organization’s entire ecosystem but their backup environment. This is a problem since, as we know, it’s now not a matter of if but when an organization will be impacted by cyberattacks like ransomware. Along with Veeam, Object First has developed a model called Zero Trust Data Resilience (ZTDR), focusing on expanding Zero Trust principles to include an organization’s backup environment. This philosophy is foundational to our approach to data protection and an organization’s cyber resilience strategy.
The core principles of Zero Trust Data Resilience are key elements in protecting your data:
- Separation of backup software and backup storage: Minimize attack surface and blast radius
- Multiple resilience zones: 3-2-1 backup rule
Immutable and encrypted backup storage: Protect backup data from modification or deletion
VMblog: With the rise in sophisticated ransomware attacks, how does your solution help organizations better prepare and respond?
Cusimano: Ootbi utilizes Veeam’s “direct-to-object” functionality, leveraging S3 object storage, providing security and immutability without sacrificing high-performance backup.
Third-party tested and constantly validated, our hardened object storage appliance with zero access to the operating system delivers an impenetrable target for Veeam backup data.
Ootbi’s hardware form factor guarantees separation between the Veeam Backup & Replication server, ensuring multiple resilience zones to stay Zero Trust Data Resilient.
VMblog: Are you participating in any speaking sessions or panel discussions at RSA 2025? Can you tell us more about these presentations?
Cusimano: Date: Wednesday, 4/30/2025
Time: 10:30 AM
Speaker: Sterling Wilson
Title: Your backups are insecure! Reinforce them with Immutability and Zero Trust.
Abstract: This session will explore how Object First Ootbi (Out-of-the-Box-Immutability) leverages Zero Trust Data Resilience (ZTDR) to strengthen defense against attacks and share key insights to ensure your data remains protected and recoverable. We’ll also discuss our newest announcements and consumption-based service offerings, bringing choice and flexibility for a secure backup storage solution.
Location: The Exhibitor Insights Theater is at Booth 2151 in the South Expo.
VMblog: What’s your perspective on the most critical cybersecurity trends that will shape the industry in 2025-2026?
Cusimano: Threat actors are becoming increasingly strategic, aiming to disrupt restore paths and corrupt backups, impacting recovery speed. To effectively secure data, immutability Zero Trust must be built into the core architecture of an organization rather than treated as optional configurations.
Independent third-party assessments, including penetration testing, will play a key role in signaling the trustworthiness of these systems, and help organizations separate truth from mere vendor claims.
VMblog: How can security leaders better prepare their organizations for the evolving threat landscape in 2025 and beyond?
Cusimano: A few short years ago, ransomware attacks were a relatively minor cause of outages compared to hardware or application failures, human errors and other incidents. Today, with 75% of organizations suffering at least one ransomware attack per year, ransomware has become an unavoidable threat-and along with the frequency of attacks, the impact of attacks has also grown dramatically in scale.
To protect against ransomware, you need a modern, multi-layered cybersecurity strategy based on Zero Trust principles that includes a full range of IT security tools and solutions such as AV, Firewall, IAM, IDS, EDR, and XDR. However, whatever Protection measures you put in place will never stop all intrusions – you must Assume Breach and Prepare for Recovery. Your last line of defense against ransomware -and the only way you can guarantee recovery-is to have immutable backup storage ensuring your backups cannot be modified or deleted, no matter what. Immutable backup storage designed for fast and scalable recovery is the ultimate Data Resilience strategy for any organization. Without absolute confidence in your backup security, recovery is at risk.
VMblog: Is your company giving away anything special or interesting at your booth this year?
Cusimano: You can play Play Trivia at Object First Booth S-260 and enter to win Headphones Airpods Max!
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