Our Predictions for 2025

2024 was a pivotal year for data resilience due to significant challenges and some remarkable advancements too. From additional regulatory frameworks like NIS2 in the EU, to cyberattacks and natural disasters, this year prompted a heightened focus on strategies to better safeguard and manage vital company data. As we stand on the edge of 2025, we see that our digital landscape is evolving at an unprecedented pace with the introduction of AI and machine learning in the world of data protection, as well as increased regulatory compliance and privacy regulations.??

In this post, we’ll dive into some of our predictions for the future of data protection so we can all walk into 2025 more resilient and prepared than ever.

?? Regulatory Compliance Will Be More Critical Than Ever

In the coming year, we’ll see an increase in the frequency and severity of cyberattacks, coupled with the need for more consistent and effective security measures. This includes more stringent cyber resilience standards with regard to mandatory backup and recovery strategies surrounding frequency, retention periods, and testing protocols.

The need for an adaptable, flexible, and resilient data protection plan and solution will become even more important since we’ll most likely see an increased likelihood of facing penalties for not meeting compliance standards like NIS2, DORA, and other upcoming regulations.

?? Ransomware Will Continue to Evolve and Attitudes Should Shift

Ransomware attacks have been a constant over recent years, and that’s not going to change in 2025 – and unfortunately, as we evolve, threat actors will too. Expect to see more ransomware attacks being used as a distraction as more sophisticated attacks target other resources and even skip the encryption phase of ransomware altogether. To combat this, your data resilience plan must include multi-layered detection capabilities to identify concurrent attacks and prevent hidden breaches. The threat of ransomware is not going away and considering its increasing prevalence over the past several years, our attitude toward facing these attacks should shift more toward normalization, rather than placing blame on parties for “allowing” an attack to take place. Removing the blame game from the equation will help close the current skills gap in IT and security and put companies in better positions to attract top talent to these critical roles.

?? AI Will Transform UI, IT Platforms, and SaaS

We’ve seen the beginnings of how AI and machine learning will affect the world of data protection this year, and this will continue in 2025. In the coming year, AI agents will have firmly established themselves as a critical component of the workforce. With the growth of goal-oriented and adaptable AI systems, UIs will evolve to become more conversational, and users will shift to be able to let users say what they want done and use AI agents to perform multi-step functions. This increased sophistication of AI will also provide the ability to deploy increased customization to IT actions, like dynamic and adaptive backup policies, as well as more adaptive, proactive, and personalized experiences.

?? The Way We Protect Data Will Evolve

As businesses are increasingly expected to move workloads from the public cloud back to on-premises datacenters, having a data protection solution that prioritizes data portability will be more important than ever. Some companies that previously shifted to the public cloud are now realizing that a hybrid cloud approach is more advantageous. The public cloud has benefits, but local infrastructure allows for more control and performance in certain cases. In 2025, we’ll see more organizations re-evaluate their data strategies to make room for more hybrid and multi-cloud modes. ?

Plus, as the demand for storing and using data grows, enterprise IT architecture will continue to evolve as well. Cloud data lake houses may become more popular in 2025, since they combine the scalability of a data lake with the more structured data management capabilities of a data warehouse. Whatever next year brings for your organization and how you protect your data, the flexibility to store your data how you want, whenever you want, will become more important than ever.

Data is our lifeblood — and the importance of building robust data resilience capabilities has never been clearer. As we head forward into the new year, it’ll be essential to approach data resilience with an open, communicative, and no-shame mindset since ransomware will continue to be almost a given in 2025. This means that planning beforehand will be key, particularly since regulatory compliance standards will become more prevalent and important to adhere to. AI will continue to become a more significant part of the world of data resilience, changing IT platforms, data lake houses,?UIs, and SaaS. With the increasing complexity of our data landscape, the freedom to move and store your data wherever makes sense for your?business will become even more important.?