3 Key Traits of an Effective Kubernetes Disaster Recovery Plan

The security of Kubernetes workloads is being thoroughly tested and evaluated. IT teams have been dealing with simultaneous spikes in cyberattacks and extreme weather events, making it extremely difficult for them to keep data out of the wrong hands or even maintain uptime. For instance, a few years ago, security researchers discovered that Kubernetes clusters were being targeted through misconfigured Argo Workflows instances. The vulnerability allowed attackers to access sensitive information, such as code and credentials, or even access an open Argo dashboard and submit their workflows. Meanwhile, in February 2022, the UK and northern Europe experienced their worst storm in 30 years, Storm Eunice, which resulted in a record number of power outages.

Unfortunately, this is the new reality for organizations and their IT teams, and it has been made even more challenging by the ongoing remote work situation. Of course, working from home has been a godsend for many employees, and it has proven to be a significant productivity booster. However, it certainly creates additional technical complexities for IT teams managing service outages or downtime incidents. Considering that 90% of containerized deployments now occur on Kubernetes, which includes some of the most business-critical applications globally, even a minor outage could cause substantial financial and reputational damage to businesses.

Essential Components of a Kubernetes Disaster Recovery Plan

For these reasons, having a plan to respond to downtime incidents quickly has become non-negotiable. Here are 3 key traits of an effective Kubernetes disaster recovery strategy.

Having a Clear Backup Location for Restored Data

Businesses need a restore plan in place before moving ahead with a backup. To ensure the seamless and speedy recovery of their Kubernetes clusters, organizations need to be clear from the outset about where their backups will be restored in the event of downtime. This task is much more challenging than it sounds, given the complexity of Kubernetes components.

The goal, however, is simple. Enterprises need the ability to quickly restore and migrate all application components to any location they choose and restore subsets of these applications as required. In an environment where the cost of downtime is increasing (now roughly $250,000 per hour), any measure that improves both the Recovery Time Objective (RTO) and the Recovery Point Objective (RPO) is vital.

A recent Wanclouds study found that nearly two-thirds of businesses experienced data loss in the past year. This finding highlights the urgent need to address this issue. According to the report, 31% of US and UK businesses that experienced data loss also suffered downtime or the unavailability of cloud services for up to 10 hours. Meanwhile, nearly a fifth (17%) reported being offline for 10 to 15 hours. IT professionals at these businesses potentially lost millions in revenue and incurred damages.

Deploying a Seamless Cloud-Native Approach

Every Disaster Recovery plan’s goal is to create a safety net for businesses to keep their applications, infrastructure, and ultimately their business running in the case of an unexpected outage. However, as the risk of downtime has increased in recent years, so has the realization that traditional Disaster Recovery plans are riddled with inefficiencies that are too numerous for the modern IT landscape, particularly when backing up Kubernetes applications.

Traditional Disaster Recovery is anything but built for containers. In truth, it’s far too complex, expensive, and unpredictable to be relied upon. Legacy approaches work by creating a parallel production setup that may not be necessary in every case. It also only backs up specific resources and objects, resulting in long recovery times during disaster situations. Moreover, it does not allow for application mobility with all its constructs and blueprints, such as network setup, security policies, configurations, and data, across cloud regions or sometimes even clouds. The ability to capture an application as a whole is, of course, crucial for Kubernetes (K8s) since it is application-centric.

This means that any IT team deploying a traditional Disaster Recovery (DR) plan for their Kubernetes is putting their organization at a greater risk of data loss or corruption. Instead, they need a cloud-native backup strategy that enables them to recover from situations such as application misconfigurations or malicious attacks, like ransomware. Cloud-native DR and backup solutions are designed to handle the vast number of components found in large clusters and need to recognize the relationships between applications and data.

To address these issues, many companies are utilizing Cloud-based Disaster Recovery as a Service (DRaaS), given its simplicity, flexibility, and reduced financial investment requirements. Analysts predict that the global DRaaS market will grow by 35% over the next five years.

Other cloud companies are addressing Kubernetes data resiliency by offering innovative software solutions that ensure containers can be protected across the growing reliance on hybrid and multi-cloud environments. For instance, Red Hat added data resilience capabilities for Kubernetes with the release of Red Hat OpenShift Container Storage 4.6. It enables customers to extend their existing data protection solutions and infrastructure, enhancing data resilience for cloud-native workloads across hybrid and multi-cloud environments.

Layering in Security to Your DR Plan

Businesses and government agencies across Europe are under siege by cyberattacks. Officials are increasingly apprehensive about the threat posed by Russian ransomware gangs to their respective countries’ critical infrastructure, as EU leaders continue to tighten sanctions. For example, one such attack, which targeted the US satellite communications company Viasat, was felt across central and eastern Europe, triggering satellite service outages.

Keeping track of permissions and credentials is a task in itself and, as we know, a significant security undertaking. To put it frankly, organizations’ workloads are more vulnerable than ever. Kubernetes clusters, in particular, are often abused in compromises that exploit their misconfigurations. They also tend to be multi-tenant, with developer teams regularly being added and removed from systems, which makes securing them even more complex.

That is why there’s an urgent need for enterprises to factor security into their Kubernetes management. The good news is that Kubernetes already has built-in security features, such as network policies, that protect internal application components and data services. The bad news is that they sometimes stop backup solutions from working outside Kubernetes clusters. A Cloud-based Disaster Recovery solution solves this problem, and the even better news is that some are even adding ransomware detection capabilities as an additional security layer.

Another valuable resource is the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) security guidelines for Kubernetes, which emphasize the importance of proactive breach prevention measures, including Kubernetes pod security, network separation and hardening, and authentication and authorization.

IT teams across Europe recognize the importance of having a straightforward and effective Kubernetes disaster recovery plan. As they rely on Kubernetes to store their most critical business applications, they realize that an effective Kubernetes disaster recovery (DR) strategy could be the iron gate that shields their entire organization and its customers from a devastating downtime incident.

How Wanclouds Can Help You Set Up Effective Disaster Recovery for Kubernetes

Wanclouds Disaster Recovery as a Service simplifies the process of establishing an effective Disaster Recovery plan for Kubernetes, reducing both financial and technical complexities. Our Managed Service solution ensures business continuity by enabling seamless backup and restoration of Kubernetes clusters, configurations, and data to a Cloud object store, with the flexibility to restore on demand to existing or new Cloud environments.

Key Features:

• Comprehensive Discovery: Discover on-premise or Cloud-managed Kubernetes clusters, configurations, and data with a single tool.
• Holistic Backups: Back up cluster configurations, persistent volumes (PVCs), and VPC networking constructs to a secure cloud object store.
• On-Demand Restoration: Restore workloads or entire clusters to existing or new cloud regions in minutes.
• Single Pane of Glass: Manage all backups (Kubernetes, VPC configs, VMs, data) through a unified interface.
• Cost-Effective: Eliminate the need for expensive parallel production setups or specialized expertise with a pay-per-use model.
• Enhanced Security: Data remains encrypted and secure within your cloud account, with optional ransomware detection.

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