Commvault's Arlie Spearheads AI Democratisation in Cyber Resiliency

In November last year, Commvault, one of the founding members of the Microsoft Security Copilot Partner Ecosystem, introduced Arlie and Threat Scan Predict to simplify software management, enhance threat detection, and bolster cyber resilience for organisations worldwide.

"Earlier clients who used our software had to go through painful steps, unlike any other software. But now, if they want to check which backup jobs failed last week, they can simply ask Arlie," Balaji Rao, area VP for India & SAARC at Commvault, explained.

Arlie, short for ‘Autonomous Resilience,’ is a generative AI tool by Commvault that is enhanced and integrated on the backend with Azure OpenAI Service. It is designed to simplify and automate data management tasks. However, its capabilities extend beyond simple queries, as it can also generate code for integrations with security tools.

"Do you want to integrate with an SIEM or a SOAR solution for cyber resiliency? For example, suppose you want to integrate with Palo Alto. In that case, you can ask Arli, 'Can you give me the code for Palo Alto integration?' and Arlie will generate that integration code for you,” explained Rao. 

Further, he said that you don't need to know the software anymore — “All you need to do is ask Arlie, and it will walk you through each one of those steps.” 

Commvault's AI applications extend to threat detection and prediction, with Threat Scan Predict identifying potential risks. “We actually use it in protection, gathering signals in advance and looking for anomalies, and we use a lot of AI in what we call Threat Scan Predict," Rao explained.

Additionally, Arlie can automatically perform various data management tasks, such as data backups, restores, and policy configurations, based on user requests or predefined schedules. This automation reduces manual effort and ensures consistent data protection.

Commvault also uses its long-standing partnership with Microsoft, which began in 1998, to deliver advanced data governance, risk mitigation, and recovery capabilities to its customers, including Adidas, Sony, and AstraZeneca. 

Commvault Cloud+Arlie = Ultimate Cybersecurity

The company’s Commvault Cloud—a SaaS-based data management solution enables organisations to protect, manage, and recover their data across on-premises, cloud, and hybrid environments. 

The integration of Commvault Arlie with Commvault Cloud brings several benefits to users. Arlie's natural language interface and intelligent recommendations make it easier for users to manage and protect their data in the cloud. 

It also provides cloud-specific insights and recommendations to optimise data protection strategies for cloud environments.

With Arlie's integration, users can automate data protection tasks for various cloud workloads, such as virtual machines, databases, and applications, reducing manual effort and ensuring consistent protection. 

Additionally, Arlie can help users optimise their cloud storage costs by recommending data tiering, archiving, and deletion strategies based on data usage patterns and retention policies.

Arlie's integration with Commvault Cloud supports multiple cloud platforms, such as AWS, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud platform. It enables users to manage and protect their data across these platforms from a single interface, simplifying multi-cloud data management.

Customer Story: Persistent Systems

AIM caught up with Persistent Systems’ CIO, Debashis Singh, who shared insights into their transition to Commvault Cloud with all its capabilities and how Microsoft’s assistance has influenced their overall strategy and the challenges they faced before the implementation.

Before adopting Commvault Cloud, Persistent Systems grappled with the complexities of managing data across hybrid environments. “We have a solution on-prem, where our cloud workload was every single day. But the ease of use was not that simple,” said Singh. 

To ensure the solution's effectiveness, Persistent Systems went beyond mere documentation. 

“As part of the exercise, we even tried simulating the environment internally, creating a completely isolated environment, putting the backup solution on top of it, injecting malware into it, and finding out whether it can detect it and give us a clean count," Singh revealed. 

With Commvault, Persistent Systems also set ambitious targets for their recovery time objective (RTO) and recovery point objective (RPO). "We set a target of 24 hours as the RTO and one hour as the RPO. RPO is essentially a recovery point of safety, which refers to the point from where you can recover,” shared Singh. 

During a simulated disaster recovery drill, Persistent Systems achieved an impressive RTO of just 8 hours and 20 minutes, surpassing their 24-hour target.

With generative AI tools such as Arlie, Commvault is upping the ante, and its commitment to democratising AI usage in cybersecurity is evident in all of its offerings. “Our platform is not the future; it is today. It is there today and in different aspects,” said Rao.