A complete collection of guidelines and tools called data security is intended to shield information from loss, alteration, and unwanted access. This includes encryption, access controls, monitoring procedures, and regular testing of disaster recovery plans.
In Kubernetes, protecting data means backing up underlying storage, images, cluster control planes, applications, deployments, services, and namespaces. A successful backup solution also needs to support disaster recovery.
Table of Contents
Encryption
A crucial component of cybersecurity is encryption, which limits access to information to those with the proper authorization and shields it from unwanted access. This also ensures that the data cannot be tampered with or deleted.
Encryption should be a feature of K8s backup solutions so that hackers cannot access critical data even if the system is compromised. The solution should also enable encryption for data in transit to avoid transferring unencrypted information between systems.
A scalable, robust Kubernetes backup and recovery solution can automate backing up and restoring clusters and applications. It can also help ensure that data is consistent across environments, making it easier to recover from a disaster or migrate an application between different clusters, clouds, and regions. It should also support DevOps workflows by auto-discovering and protecting new and changing applications without requiring developers to modify their code. It should also offer granularity to backup and restore YAML manifests and Pods. Additionally, it should support multiple storage options such as on-premises, cloud, and remote/edge locations.
Access Control
Access control consists of three components: confidentiality, integrity, and availability. The goals of confidentiality, integrity, and availability are to stop the illegal disclosure of information—such as credit card numbers or personally identifiable information—to prevent unauthorized changes to data and to guarantee that systems are accessible for regular usage.
Many organizations don’t back up Kubernetes with native tools and instead rely on general-purpose backup and recovery products tweaked to support container environments like K8s. Some of these products offer more granular K8s-specific features, while others focus on providing an enterprise-wide view of applications and data for more accessible protection and disaster recovery.
A good Kubernetes backup solution will enable customers to customize the frequency of backups based on their needs and the amount of data changing over time. Additionally, the tool should allow for one-click restoration. Moreover, the tool should provide the flexibility to back up YAML manifests and persistent volumes and the ability to discover and protect applications automatically. This flexibility makes it easy for developers to restore and recover Kubernetes environments. At the same time, the tool should allow them to maintain their isolation policies for application access.
Storage Options
A robust backup deployment is critical to ensuring the resilience and recoverability of your Kubernetes environment. By regularly taking snapshots of your data and configurations, you can protect against system failures and cyber threats that may otherwise compromise your critical information and applications.
While traditional backup solutions focus on backing up a single virtual machine, containerized applications are more complex. They run in multiple pods across different machines and contain many objects with application data and configuration. A Kubernetes backup solution must capture this information at a granular level to ensure consistent snapshots and fast restores.
Many backup tools can create a snapshot of your data and configurations, but not all are created equal. Some have limited capabilities, while others, such as Rubrik, can create a full backup of all kinds of Kubernetes data, including Deployments, Namespaces, Storage Infrastructure, Services, Pods and StatefulSets, and Persistent Volumes. This gives you a complete and comprehensive picture of your backups to retrieve the necessary information during a disaster or other catastrophic data loss.
Version Control
Without backup and recovery mechanisms, Kubernetes environments would have a much higher data loss or disruption risk. A robust Kubernetes backup solution can help organizations prevent expensive downtime and data loss caused by scheduled or unscheduled outages.
Kubernetes backup solutions capture and store copies of all application data, enabling businesses to restore applications with minimal downtime and disruption. This helps ensure that business operations are preserved even during a disaster.
A good Kubernetes backup solution will also provide version control. This enables organizations to track changes to their backups and recover from previous versions of applications. This can help organizations meet regulatory compliance standards, which may require maintaining historical data backups.
Kubernetes backup and storage solutions are designed to work with modern containerized architectures’ dynamic and distributed nature. They are designed to protect these applications by backing up all of their stateful and stateless components in an automated manner without any developer intervention. They should support the DevOps shift-left approach, allowing developers to develop and deploy applications with the confidence that they will be protected and recovered.
Reliability
Reliability is an essential factor to consider for a Kubernetes backup solution. Businesses should be able to rely on their backup systems to minimize downtime and restore applications quickly. Whether from hardware failures, data loss, or security breaches, reliable backups are critical for upholding business operations.
Containerized applications are complex to back up using traditional solutions designed to back up VMs. This is because the state of a containerized application is stored in persistent storage volumes, while stateless components are distributed across multiple servers to improve performance and fault tolerance. Backing up a containerized application without preserving the state and data in a separate location can lead to misconfigurations, failed restores, and lost data.
Fortunately, several third-party backup and recovery solutions provide reliable Kubernetes backup capabilities. Rubrik, for example, can back up all kinds of Kubernetes data – Deployments, Namespaces, Storage Infrastructure, Services, Pods, and StatefulSets. Other solutions, such as Zerto, can work with all kinds of Kubernetes data types, including applications and databases, enabling them to offer more comprehensive protection for your businesses.
