How to Ensure Compliance with the NIS2 Directive for Your SaaS Infrastructure

The Network Information Security Directive, or NIS2, sets new cybersecurity benchmarks for companies in or conducting business within the EU. The directive’s primary goal is to bolster cybersecurity resilience by requiring organizations to implement comprehensive risk-management measures, including data backup management and disaster recovery. If NIS2 impacts your company, compliance demands that you ensure business continuity by being prepared for disruptions like cyberattacks and natural disasters and safeguard critical SaaS data to minimize downtime and risks.

NIS2 Requirements at a Glance

NIS2 “mandates an ‘all-hazards’ approach, meaning that entities must be prepared to address a wide range of threats, from cyberattacks to physical disruptions, ensuring comprehensive protection and resilience in their operations.” Meanwhile, NIS2’s Article 21 says that you, “must take appropriate and proportionate technical, operational and organizational measures to manage the risks posed to the security of network and information systems which those entities use for their operations or for the provision of their services, and to prevent or minimize the impact of incidents on recipients of their services and on other services.”

Like GDPR, which focuses on protecting personal data, NIS2 emphasizes the importance of minimizing cyber risks and ensuring business continuity. Again, like GDPR, businesses within its purview must prioritize their data resilience strategies to avoid penalties for non-compliance.

Preparing for NIS2 Compliance: Three Key Steps

Meeting NIS2’s stringent requirements starts by adopting the Map-Prioritize-Test framework:

1. Map Critical Systems

Conduct a thorough assessment of your critical infrastructure, including on-premises and public and private cloud environments. Map vital systems and software and prioritize SaaS applications, like Entra ID, to protect identities and credentials. 

2. Prioritize Essential Data

Identify data critical for maintaining access and operation, such as financial, customer, and proprietary information. Determine which data should be restored first to minimize downtime and ensure business continuity.

3 . Test Backup Systems

Regularly test your backups to verify that your data can be recovered when needed. Consistent testing instills confidence in your disaster recovery plan and identifies areas for improvement.

Selecting the Right SaaS Backup Solution

Compliance with NIS2 requires that you deploy a reliable backup and recovery solution. Consider these factors as you evaluate your options:

Data Sovereignty and Privacy

Choose a solution that complies with EU regulations, including GDPR. Look for a provider that offers explicit guarantees regarding data sovereignty, ensuring your data is stored and processed in line with regional laws. Strong access controls are essential to protect sensitive data from unauthorized access.

Recovery Time

Your solution must support granular and prioritized recovery options to ensure fast restoration of critical data. That will minimize downtime and ensure business continuity. 

Encryption and Immutability

Protect your backups from cybercriminals by choosing a solution that encrypts your data in transit and at rest and supports immutable backups to prevent unauthorized changes or deletions. 

Vendor Independence

Select a SaaS backup provider that ensures logical and physical separation from your SaaS vendor’s public cloud. Combined with air-gapping measures, this approach protects your backups from ransomware attacks and ensures continued access even if your public cloud provider’s services are disrupted.

Arcserve SaaS Backup: Comprehensive, Cloud-Native Backup for SaaS Apps

Arcserve SaaS Backup is designed to protect your data hosted in SaaS application clouds such as Microsoft 365, Entra ID, Microsoft Dynamics 365, Salesforce, Google Workspace, and Zendesk.

The solution is secure, scalable, and always available, with data encrypted in transit and at rest with a default 30-day delete retention. Four copies of your backup data are stored in two different data centers within the same region, guaranteeing data sovereignty and redundancy.

Arcserve’s SaaS Backup data centers maintain ISO/IEC 27001:2013 and ISAE 3402-II certifications and comply with key regulations, such as HIPAA, NIS2, and GDPR.

A fast and intuitive user interface, combined with multi-tenant and role-based access control (RBAC), offers visibility into and control over protected data. 

Want to learn more about Arcserve SaaS Backup? Request a demo today.

If you’re ready to take a test drive within your own environment, check out our 30-day free trial offer.