Business Challenges
As one of Asia’s largest oil and gas producers, the company plays a vital role in meeting fuel supply needs. Its operations in Indonesia include several large oil and gas blocks on major islands, involving the exploitation, development, production and marketing of crude oil and natural gas. To run large operations with minimal environmental impact, the company relies on sensitive data such as fluid dynamics models, market reports and weather forecasts.
To maintain smooth operations, quick access to key information about wells and drilling sites is essential. Unexpected downtime can hamper exploration and production, resulting in substantial business costs.
In order to minimize risks associated with operational disruptions, the company, which has been established for decades in Indonesia, is already quite aware of data protection and security. Evidently, the company has secured data through a data backup and recovery system.
Although threats can come at any time, improving data security protection is necessary. Unfortunately, the protection and maintenance are not up to the best standards.
Moreover, it has not maximized data security features at the storage level.
When a ransomware attack can stalk anyone, especially data from large companies, the impact can be very significant. One of the private companies in the oil and gas sector with branches spread across Indonesia has faced serious risks related to data security, especially with the increasingly complex and destructive ransomware threat. The ransomware attack on the company’s production systems had a direct impact on its operations, disrupting production, distribution and operational management processes. Impacts can include oil and gas production delays, financial losses, and potentially costly data corruption or loss.
Solution: Three Optimal, Fast & Efficient System Recovery Options
To overcome the ransomware attack and restore operational processes back to normal, it was necessary to restore the production system and improve the data security system.
Because this oil and gas company has a backup and data storage system that is separate from the main system. This is a very strategic mitigation when facing an attack on data like what happened in this case.
The company is trying to restore its operations with the help of Juke Solutions’ professional team. As IT consultants who focus on the impact of a given solution, Juke’s IT Infrastructure team responded quickly to reports of a ransomware attack and began a recovery process structured as follows:
- Detection:
Juke Solutions team identifies systems affected by the ransomware attack, identifying points of corruption or failure that need to be addressed.
- Diagnosis/Decision:
Through in-depth analysis, the team determines the optimal Recovery Point and recovery strategy that fits the company’s needs.
- Restoration:
Data was moved back to the primary system using secondary data sources, including storage snapshots, data replication, and backup media.
- Recovery:
Once the data is restored, the application environment is repaired and additional steps such as log and performance monitoring are performed to ensure the system is functioning optimally.
- Test and Verification:
The recovery process is tested and verified to ensure that the company’s production systems are fully recovered and operating properly.
Three Optimal, Fast & Efficient Recovery Options
Juke Solutions’ expert team provides recovery solutions on internal and external protection. Internal protection is performed on Data Protection in storage by restoring from Storage Snapshot protection and restoring from Disaster Recovery Center site. While external protection is done through the data backup process and suspended on a backup system that is separate from the production system. Here are three production system recovery options recommended by Juke Solutions, among others:
1. Using Storage Snapshots
Storage snapshots are an effective recovery method to overcome ransomware attacks. In this option, data is recovered from a snapshot created before the attack occurred. A snapshot is an instant copy of a system or volume at a specific point in time. By using snapshots, companies can restore data to its pre-attack state, eliminating the impact of ransomware. The main advantage of this method is the speed of recovery and minimal downtime. However, it is important to ensure that snapshots are stored securely and separately from the main system to prevent ransomware from infecting or deleting the snapshot itself.
2. Using a DRC Site
The second option is to use a Disaster Recovery Center (DRC) site to recover data. A DRC is a location or backup center that serves as a copy of a company’s production environment. Regularly replicated data from the production environment is stored in the DRC, so that in the event of a ransomware attack, data can be recovered from a secure source outside the infected network. This approach ensures data reliability and availability in emergency situations, as the DRC is usually located in a different physical location and is run independently of the production environment.
3. Using Backup Data
The last option is to use backup data as an alternative recovery source. Backup data is a complete copy of the data stored in a safe place separate from the production environment. If storage snapshots and DRC are unavailable or insufficient, backup data can be used as the last source of recovery. However, the recovery process from backup data may take longer than the previous options, depending on the size and complexity of the data. It is important to ensure that backup data is kept regularly updated and securely stored to ensure availability when needed in emergency situations.
Results: Production System Back in Operation with Minimum Downtime & In Just Hours!
With a solid collaboration between Juke Solutions team and the company’s IT team, the oil and gas company managed to restore its production system with minimal downtime. Process-wise, the data recovery took place in a matter of hours. But overall, it takes a maximum of 3 days for the system to return to normal and be accessible again to users due to the many systems checks to ensure the recovery process is up to standard. A fast and efficient recovery process allows companies to avoid a greater impact on operations and reputation.
Data Protection from Ransomware Threats
To minimize the risk of data loss due to unexpected attacks, Juke Solutions team provided mitigation efforts to this company in two ways:
A. Back up and Storage System Update
Although the company already has a backup & storage system, Juke Solutions team still strengthens data security by updating the back up and storage system. Through technical refreshments and feature additions, data backup process becomes more efficient and can better deal with ransomware threats.
B. Implementing Back Up Best Practices
In addition, the team also implemented back up best practices which include:
- Restricting user access to storage to reduce the risk of unauthorized access.
- Ensuring a sufficient number of available snapshots (sufficient recovery points) to ensure timely data recovery.
- Replicating data to a Disaster Recovery Center (DRC) to ensure the availability of backup data outside the infected network.
- Continuously update backup and storage systems to be ready for the evolving threat of ransomware.
- By implementing this strategy, companies can be better prepared and protected from the risk of data loss due to unexpected ransomware attacks.
With this approach, the company is better protected against unexpected downtime, whether because of a cyber-attack or an onsite emergency. The solutions and recommended tools provided by Juke Solutions team have dramatically reduced the amount of time the company’s IT team spends on backup and recovery maintenance-helping them focus on innovation. In fact, now half of one full-time equivalent can easily manage backups for all regions.
If this company experiences unexpected downtime, a standard backup process of storage updates can minimize business disruption with timely copies of data and applications-ensuring rapid recovery. Improved backup performance and customizability to protect data crucial to the company’s mission of maintaining energy security. The company’s IT team has enjoyed excellent performance for all backup operations since the upgrade of the backup and storage system. As a result, the team can smoothly increase capacity as the business expands. This provides excellent IT services for all business units of the oil and gas company.
Protecting data from ransomware attacks requires a comprehensive approach involving technology, processes, and people. No one tool can guarantee complete protection, therefore, integrated layers of protection are key to reducing the risk of ransomware attacks and ensuring rapid recovery in the event of an incident.
Juke Solutions as a Trusted Business Partner!
If your company is experiencing a situation like the case above, don’t panic! Trust solutions for your back up, data storage, and IT infrastructure needs to Juke Solutions.
As a company that has been established for more than 12 years, we have handled various cases in the IT field by providing effective solutions. We are committed to providing impactful solutions based on integrity and professionalism, by combining our technical expertise and a deep understanding of the latest technology trends.