Securing Immutable Backups: Testing Access and Infrastructure Vulnerabilities

Explore a 32-minute Black Hat conference talk that delves into the vulnerabilities of immutable backup systems and their implementation challenges in ransomware protection strategies. Learn how pen testers discovered that while WORM (write once, read many) and immutable backups with set retention periods are designed to be tamper-proof, the infrastructure hosting these backups remains susceptible to attacks. Follow along as security engineers from Northwestern Mutual share their methodologies, setbacks, and breakthrough findings from testing three vendor solutions, demonstrating why targeting the hosting servers proved more effective than attempting to compromise the immutable data itself. Gain valuable insights into the real-world security implications of relying on immutable backups as a safeguard against ransomware attacks and catastrophic outages.