EC2 backup

Clumio supports Amazon EC2 instance backups and Snaps. EC2 backups and Snaps are configured through the Policies window. For more information about backups and Snaps and how they are configured through the Policies wizard, see backup policies.

EC2 backups represent full, standalone copies of your EC2 instances. An EC2 backup protects the following assets of an EC2 instance:

• EBS storage volumes that are attached to the instance.
• Root volumes of EC2 instances, including ones that are launched from AWS Marketplace Amazon Machine Images (AMIs).
• The EC2 instance configuration, including the EBS volumes specification, the paid AWS Marketplace AMIs, and the Snap configurations. If the instance only contains instance store volumes, Clumio backs up the instance store configuration, but not the instance store volumes. If the instance contains a mix of EBS and instance store volumes, Clumio backs up the EBS volumes only.

Each backup is saved remotely to Clumio and retained for the length of time set by the Clumio unified policy. During the retention period, you can restore an EBS volume from any unexpired EBS backup. After the retention period expires, the backup is destroyed. Clumio offers two tiers of SecureVault backup: SecureVault Lite and SecureVault Standard. SecureVault Lite backups provide the same air-gap ransomware protection as the SecureVault Standard tier, but must be retained for a minimum of 30 days. For a comparison of the two tiers, refer to the following table:

For more information, see SecureVault Backup Tier Options.

Note: File Level Indexing (FLI) for EC2 backups does not fully support international character sets for POSIX file systems (ext4/ext3/btrfs/xfs). This may result in a garbled display of some characters while browsing file indexes.

There are two ways to generate EC2 backups:

• Recurring backups
• On-demand backups

Recurring backups

Configure a policy to automatically generate recurring backups at the configured intervals and keep those backups for the configured retention periods. See EC2 policies for details about how to configure recurring backups.

When an EC2 instance is protected, Clumio starts the backup seeding process to synchronize the data between the resource and Clumio. The initial backup seeding process creates a full backup of the EC2 instance and saves it to Clumio. After that, backups are generated based on the policy’s configured schedule.

Recurring backups can be configured to occur at various frequencies throughout the year, with yearly backups retained for up to 7 years.

Optionally enable a backup window to specify the time zone and start and end times of the backup window. When a backup window is enabled, backups will only occur between the stated start and end times. Note that recurring backups usually start about 5 minutes after the start time. Backups that are still in progress by the end of the backup window will be aborted. You cannot define a backup window if you enable backups to occur in hourly increments. Backup windows do not impact on-demand backups.

On-demand backups

On-demand backups represent single backups that are manually generated at any point in time and retained in Clumio. You can take SecureVault backups or on-demand snapshots. Each on-demand snapshot can be retained for up to 1 year. Each on-demand SecureVault backup is retained for 7 days if you select the Standard Tier and for 30 days if you select the Lite Tier.

Generate an EC2 backup on demand

1. Select AWS > Environments > [Account Number] > EC2 Instances. The Active EC2 Instances window displays with a list of EC2 instances that have been inventoried into Clumio.
2. Click the instance ID of the EC2 instance you want to back up on demand. A calendar view of the current month displays along with a detailed view of the volume.
3. In the upper right corner of the details screen, click Take Backup > SecureVault Backup. The Take On-Demand Backup dialog displays.
4. Select a SecureVault Backup tier and a retention period, the default is 7 days if you select the Standard Tier and 30 days if you select the Lite Tier.
5. Select a destination to save the backup, the default is In-region.
6. Click Take Backup. Clumio starts the EC2 On-demand backup task. When the backup job is complete, it appears in the Protection History calendar of the EC2 instance, ready to be restored at any time.

EC2 snapshots

EC2 snapshots capture instantaneous pictures of your EC2 data at a certain point in time. An EC2 snapshot protects the following assets:

• EBS storage volumes that are attached to the instance.
• Root volumes of EC2 instances, including ones that are launched from AWS Marketplace Amazon Machine Images (AMIs).

Each snapshot is stored in the same location as the EC2 instance - that is, your AWS account – and retained for the length of time set by the Clumio unified policy. During the retention period, you can restore an EC2 instance from any unexpired EC2 backup. After the retention period expires, the backup is destroyed.

There are two ways to generate EC2 snapshots:

• Recurring Snaps
• On-demand Snaps

Configure a policy to automatically generate recurring snapshots at the specified intervals and retain them for the specified periods.

On-demand snapshots represent single snapshots that are manually generated at any point  in time. Each on-demand snapshot can be retained for up to 1 year. By default, on-demand snapshots are retained for 7 days.

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Note: Additionally, if you have existing EC2 Snapshots in your AWS accounts that you must retain for long-term compliance, we can move a copy of those snapshots to our SecureVault storage, allowing for faster and easier recovery, at a lower cost. Contact [email protected]) for more information.

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