Making Mad Stacks from Layers

OpenDNS and eFolder just kicked off a multicity lunch and learn tour to educate MSPs on how to integrate security and business continuity into managed service offerings. This joint solution roadshow was inspired by talking with eFolder partners about how essential cloud backup and BDR are in a true layered security strategy.

First, let me share a story. At IT Nation last year, I had four different meals with eFolder partners to catch up on business and life. During every meal, our partners shared how one of their clients was recently infected with the CryptoLocker ransomware attacks, which endanger client data by maliciously encrypting the contents of servers, desktops or laptops.

At that time, the CryptoLocker outbreak was running wild. Fortunately, in each case relayed by our partners, client data was safe because all of the data from impacted servers was backed up and protected with eFolder BDR. No ransoms were paid; the bad guys were told to buzz off; and all the partners needed to do was roll back to a recovery point before the attack and restore the client’s data and server. At IT Nation, OpenDNS was also very active in promoting its Umbrella security service, an MSP-focused security service for defending against malware infections, hacker attacks and ransomware infections like CryptoLocker.

One-Two Punch for Savvy Partners

This leads us to our lunch and learn seminar tour. Security and business continuity are a one-two punch for savvy partners. In my personal experience, partners who have built true managed security and managed business continuity services are the most profitable partners. What can be more foundational—and, hence, profitable–than securing clients, protecting their data, and ensuring uptime and resiliency for their infrastructure?

While nearly every partner has a preferred brand of firewall or endpoint AV, too often critical layers of security and protection are left undone. Yes, the client has a firewall, but are you scanning for viruses and malware at the gateway? Are you blocking dangerous applications, like consumer-grade Dropbox, at the firewall, at the network layer, and on employee endpoints? Are you leveraging technologies like OpenDNS’ predictive security? And have you deployed image-based backup and BDR solutions to completely defend a client’s data and operational resiliency?

Too often, the answer is “Not yet” or “We’ll get there soon enough.” Unfortunately, the bad guys aren’t waiting around. Rather, they are standing, ready to continue to wreak havoc and steal from your clients.

Bullet-Proof Solutions

With this reality in mind, OpenDNS and eFolder are on the road to help partners grasp how all of these solutions can fit together to better defend clients and improve the partner’s bottom line. One of my favorite slides from the seminar shows how bullet-proof glass is made. To truly stop a bullet, you don’t just use a really thick piece of glass. Instead, bulletproof glass is made from layers of glass and polycarbonate, bonded together in layers, one after another. In a similar way, MSPs should deploy layers of security and protection–not just AV and next-generation firewalls, but additional layers such as business-grade and secure file sync; cloud-based security like OpenDNS; and eFolder BDR for business continuity and disaster recovery. Doing so not only better protects the client, but it creates a premium and highly differentiated managed service offering that commands top dollar from clients, along with industry-leading profit margins.

If partners can stack up the layers of defense for clients, they will be stacking up the dollars in no time, as well.

Ted Hulsy is VP of marketing at eFolder, which offers branded cloud backup, BDRs, cloud file sync, replication, and email security solutions designed for MSPs. Guest blogs such as this one are published regularly, and are part of MSPmentor’s Cloud-based File Syncing and Sharing InfoCenter.