World Backup Day: Why recovery is more important today than the backup itself
On World Backup Day, the focus is traditionally on data backup. However, many IT security experts believe that this approach now falls short: the decisive factor is no longer just whether data is backed up, but whether it can be restored quickly, completely and cleanly in the event of an emergency.
«Anyone can do backup. Recovery is the art!» says Tobias Pföhler from Stormagic. Backup strategies have long been geared towards centralized infrastructures. In modern, distributed IT environments, however, this model is increasingly becoming a risk. «When recovery becomes a waiting game, business comes to a standstill,» says Pföhler.
Particularly in decentralized infrastructures with multiple locations or limited connectivity, it is clear that traditional backup concepts are no longer sufficient. Current data copies need to be moved closer to the location where they are used, while recovery processes need to be tested and validated across multiple locations.
Identities as a critical factor in a crisis
In addition to applications and data, identity systems are increasingly becoming the focus of recovery strategies. Sean Deuby, Principal Technologist at Semperis, warns against underestimating their importance: «Identity recovery is becoming an increasingly important part of crisis management.»
Without functioning identity systems such as Active Directory, Microsoft Entra ID, Okta or Ping Identity, it is impossible to communicate securely or access systems in a controlled manner after an attack. «If identities are lost or cannot be verified, this not only makes technical recovery more difficult, but also communication, coordination and decision-making,» says Deuby.
Artificial intelligence tightens the requirements
The increasing use of agent-based AI is creating additional pressure. Martin Zugec, Technical Solutions Director at Bitdefender, sees this as a fundamental change in data resilience: «Agentic AI demands new standards for data protection.»
AI increases the amount of data exponentially and at the same time extends the necessary data history in order to detect and rectify creeping errors or so-called data poisoning. Companies therefore need to check whether their backup history goes back far enough to find a trustworthy restore point in the event of an emergency.
New key figures for cyber resilience
According to experts, traditional key figures such as Recovery Time Objective (RTO) and Recovery Point Objective (RPO) are also reaching their limits. Marc Molyneux, Field CTO at Commvault, calls for new quality standards in cyber resilience. The focus is increasingly on the so-called «mean time to clean recovery» - i.e. the time until business-critical systems are completely clean and functional.
According to industry surveys, this is due to a clear discrepancy between expectations and reality: while many companies assume that they can get systems up and running again within a few days, in practice it often takes much longer to fully recover from cyber attacks.
World Backup Day 2026 thus shows one thing above all: data backup remains necessary - but the ability to recover cleanly is crucial to a company's resilience today.
