Survey Says: Cyber Recovery is More Complicated Than Disaster Recovery
It’s not all black and white when it comes to disaster recovery vs. cyber recovery. Despite the differences, many organizations integrate cyber recovery planning into their broader disaster recovery programs.
Cyber recovery is more complicated than disaster recovery because organizations must go beyond system restoration. With cyber recovery, organizations must first identify the attack, determine when data became compromised, verify backup integrity, and confirm that recovered environments are malware-free.
Unlike traditional disasters, cyber incidents require clean recovery, threat validation, and coordinated security and recovery workflows before operations can safely resume.
What’s the difference between disaster recovery and cyber recovery? While they might seem similar at first, a deeper dive reveals significant differences.
We partnered with ESG to explore these distinctions, surveying 500 IT and security leaders worldwide. Our findings, detailed in the report “Preparedness Gap: Why Cyber-recovery Demands a Different Approach From Disaster Recovery,” highlight the greater complexity and reach of cyber recovery.
This free report is packed with data that could change your approach to cyber recovery.
6 Key Findings
Confidence is not high
Only 26% of respondents are confident in their ability to protect all mission-critical applications and data. And only 20% are confident they’re protecting all apps and data needed to remain operational.
Complexity and differentiation
Cyber recovery is significantly more complicated than traditional disaster recovery. Among our respondents, 64% say cyber recovery technology is more complex, and 59% believe finding and retaining cyber recovery staff with the right skills is harder. While both aim to restore operations, cyber recovery involves additional steps for successful recovery.
Greater challenges with cyber recovery
Nearly all respondents (91%) say the complexity with cyber recovery begins with spending significant time and effort on forensic analysis to determine the full scope of the incident. And 85% say recovery without establishing a cleanroom environment creates significant risk of reinfection. A similar number of respondents (83%) fear that rushing to recover from a cyber incident could destroy valuable evidence.
Specialized processes and technologies
It’s not just the extra steps needed that makes cyber recovery more complicated. Effective cyber recovery requires specialized processes and technologies as well. Sixty-four percent of respondents say the technologies for cyber recovery are more complex than traditional disaster recovery. And people skills are a problem. Fifty-nine percent of respondents report finding and retaining staff with the right skills is harder for cyber recovery than disaster recovery.
Attacks are targeting more than data
Ransomware payments are typically motivated by recovery time objectives (RTO), so attackers know that taking out the backup infrastructure will exacerbate the situation for the victim. Among our respondents, 92% say they’ve suffered from attacks that explicitly target backups, and 71% say those kinds of attacks account for half or more of all attacks. The good news is the majority (88%) report that they’re taking extra measures to protect at least some or all of their backup copies.
Alignment with disaster recovery
It’s not all black and white when it comes to disaster recovery vs. cyber recovery. Despite the differences, many organizations integrate cyber recovery planning into their broader disaster recovery programs. Over 52% of organizations include cyber recovery as part of their disaster recovery strategy, and even when managed separately, there is a high degree of alignment in processes and protocols.
What’s the Difference Between Disaster Recovery and Cyber Recovery?
Disaster recovery focuses on restoring operations after unintentional events like hardware failures, fires, or natural disasters. However, cyber recovery addresses deliberate attacks such as ransomware and data breaches, where attackers actively target systems and compromise data integrity. Unlike traditional disaster recovery, cyber recovery requires organizations to investigate threats, validate that backups are clean, isolate infected environments, and coordinate recovery across IT and security teams before safely restoring operations.
| Category | Disaster Recovery | Cyber Recovery |
| Primary Goal | Restore operations after accidental or environmental disruptions. | Restore clean operations after malicious cyberattacks. |
| Typical Threats | Hardware failure, power outage, flood, fire, natural disaster. | Ransomware, malware, insider threats, data breaches, supply chain attacks. |
| Data Integrity Concerns | Focuses on restoring available data quickly. | Requires validating that data and backups are uncompromised before recovery. |
| Recovery Complexity | Follows predefined failover and restoration processes. | Requires investigation, containment, forensics, validation, and selective restoration. |
| Backup Requirements | Standard backup and replication strategies. | Immutable, air-gapped, isolated, and continuously validated backups. |
| Recovery Environment | Production or secondary disaster recovery infrastructure. | Secure isolated cleanroom environments to prevent reinfection. |
| Testing Approach | Periodic disaster recovery drills and failover testing. | Frequent cyber recovery simulations with cleanroom validation and forensic analysis. |
| Recommended Capabilities | Replication, backup, failover, business continuity planning. | Immutable backups, anomaly detection, cleanroom recovery, cyber forensics, rapid rebuild capabilities. |
Best Practices for Improving Cyber Recovery
According to a Commvault report, 92% of organizations have experienced attacks explicitly targeting backup data, yet only 26% are fully confident in their ability to protect all mission-critical applications and data during cyber recovery events. This preparedness gap exposes a critical weakness in modern cyber resilience strategies.
To strengthen cyber recovery readiness, organizations should adopt a dedicated cyber resilience framework that extends beyond traditional disaster recovery planning. Key best practices include:
- Protecting backup infrastructure with immutable, isolated, and air-gapped copies.
- Conducting regular cyber recovery testing and validation exercises.
- Establishing secure cleanroom environments for forensic analysis and recovery validation to reduce reinfection risk.
- Verifying that recovered data is clean, uncompromised, and safe before restoring operations.
Because cyberattacks can simultaneously impact systems, applications, infrastructure, and data, organizations also should improve coordination between IT and security teams, automate recovery workflows where possible, and prioritize the recovery of mission-critical assets. Continuous testing, planning, and investment are essential for building long-term cyber resilience.
Why a Different Emphasis on Cyber Recovery Matters
Let’s be honest, ransomware attacks are downright nasty. Aside from the obvious data loss and downtime:
- 44% of respondents report reputational damage and customer loss.
- 42% report theft of sensitive data from employees/customers/partners.
- 40% report compliance violations.
- 32% say such attacks resulted in third-party liability/legal action.
On the financial side, nearly a quarter of respondents (23%) report having paid a ransom last year, with the average largest payment reportedly being nearly $3 million. Given those high stakes, it’s vital to learn all you can to prepare your organization to tackle the complexities of cyber recovery.
Take a look at the full report here. If you’re looking to bolster your cyber recovery capabilities, I invite you to check out Beyond Disaster Recovery: Why You Need a Different Strategy When Ransomware Strikes.
Learn More
Watch our webinar “Cracking the Code: Recover 99% Faster from Cyber Attacks” to learn how you can help improve your cyber recovery plan and minimize downtime.
And check out these other blogs in our series on cyber resilience and minimum viability:
Frequently Asked Questions
What is cyber recovery?
Cyber recovery is the process of restoring systems, applications, and data after a cyberattack such as ransomware or a data breach. Unlike traditional recovery, cyber recovery focuses on restoring clean, validated data while preventing reinfection and minimizing operational disruption.
What is disaster recovery?
Disaster recovery is a strategy for restoring IT systems, infrastructure, and operations after disruptive events such as hardware failures, natural disasters, or outages. Disaster recovery focuses on minimizing downtime and maintaining business continuity through backup and recovery processes.
How does Commvault support cyber resilience?
Commvault supports cyber resilience through integrated backup, recovery, automation, threat detection, cleanroom recovery, and immutable storage capabilities. Our technologies help organizations maintain operations and recover quickly from cyberattacks and outages.
What is an RTO in cyber recovery?
Recovery Time Objective (RTO) is the maximum acceptable amount of time an application, system, or service can remain unavailable after an outage or cyberattack. Organizations use RTOs to prioritize recovery efforts and help reduce operational disruption.
What is a cleanroom environment?
A cleanroom environment is a secure, isolated recovery space used to investigate cyber incidents and validate that backup data is free from malware before restoration. Cleanrooms help organizations recover safely while reducing the risk of reinfection.
Why are immutable backups important?
Immutable backups are designed to prevent modification, encryption, or deletion by attackers once they are created. They provide a trusted recovery point during ransomware attacks and help organizations restore clean data even if primary systems or standard backups are compromised.