ARIA S.p.A. Secures Healthcare Data for 10M Citizens
“The impact of a ransomware attack from a human standpoint would be devastating. It could force facilities to shut down and deprive someone of access to critical, life-saving services. Our partnership with Rubrik has empowered us to protect the sensitive data of 10 million citizens and 32 healthcare institutions, ensuring we are resilient in the face of cyberthreats.”
Roberto Nocera
Director of IT Infrastructure & Cloud Transformation Officer, ARIA S.p.A.
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Challenges
As the central IT hub for the healthcare system of the Lombardy Region—Italy’s most populous area—ARIA’s mission is to manage and protect highly sensitive patient data for over 40 healthcare institutions. Recognizing the increasing threat landscape in healthcare, ARIA needed to move beyond a fragmented and reactive legacy setup and adopt a modern cyber resilience strategy.
ARIA was facing significant risks from:
1
Vulnerability to ransomware
2
Fragmented legacy backup solutions
3
Risk of reputational damage and penalties
With the security of 10 million citizens’ sensitive health data at stake, ARIA required a comprehensive, unified platform to ensure unwavering operational continuity and regulatory compliance.
Outcomes
Partnering with Rubrik helped ARIA achieve:
$100k/year TCO Savings
By leveraging Rubrik Cloud Vault for a cost-effective, air-gapped cyber vault with immutable data copies
80% Enhanced Critical Service Coverage
Securing 5 petabytes of sensitive data across 32 out of 40 medical institutions and ensuring continuity for over 10 million citizen
5:1 Tool Consolidation Ratio
Removed legacy complexity, simplified data security, and significantly reduced administrative overhead
Flawless Audit Pass and Zero Remediation
By establishing a robust security posture with a “golden copy” of data that aligns with NIST frameworks and meets medical institution protection requirements
Background
ARIA is a regional public sector company operating under the direction and coordination of the Lombardy Region in Northern Italy. Founded in 2019 via the merger of prior procurement and IT service entities, ARIA acts as the central purchasing authority for Lombard public administrations. In addition, ARIA is responsible for driving digital transformation within the region’s public sector and for overseeing development, renovation, and management of public infrastructure on behalf of the Lombardy region.
Company Details
Healthcare, Public Sector
EMEA | Milan, Italy
40 Healthcare Institutions
350 Employees
Critical Health Infrastructure and Patient Lives at Risk from Ransomware
For a critical public sector entity like ARIA, downtime is not an option; a cyber incident could halt essential clinical services, directly jeopardizing patient well-being. ARIA faced unacceptable risk because its reliance on a fragmented, complex mix of five legacy backup tools (including Veeam, EMC, Veritas, Commvault, and Acronis) lacked the immutability and centralized control needed to withstand modern threats. As Roberto Nocera, Director of IT Infrastructure & Cloud Transformation Officer, noted, “Our reliance on multiple legacy solutions meant we were flying blind to compliance gaps and couldn’t guarantee a clean recovery point. When patient lives are on the line, that uncertainty is an unacceptable risk.” Without a comprehensive solution, a successful ransomware event could:
Halt life-saving medical services and systems for days.
Compromise citizen trust and result in significant financial and reputational damage.
Complicate GDPR compliance and expose the region to severe regulatory penalties.
A Proactive Partnership for Unwavering Cyber Resilience
To transform its cybersecurity posture and support its ambitious cloud-first strategy, ARIA partnered with Rubrik to unify data protection across on-prem and cloud environments. This shifted their approach from reactive defense to proactive, business-enabling resilience. This move replaced the complex, fragmented legacy stack with a single, integrated platform designed to deliver immutable backups, cloud-native protection, and a clear “golden copy” recovery path.
By consolidating legacy tools into one modern platform, ARIA immediately achieved a 5:1 tool consolidation ratio, dramatically simplifying data security and realizing significant cost savings. The implementation of Rubrik Cloud Vault was key, establishing a logically air-gapped, immutable cyber vault.
“Rubrik Cloud Vault provides us with an air-gapped, immutable copy of our data, creating a ‘golden copy’ that can’t be compromised. This not only gives us peace of mind but also allows us to move forward with our digital transformation initiatives with confidence.”
Roberto Nocera
Director of IT Infrastructure & Cloud Transformation Officer, ARIA
To ensure maximum operational confidence, the partnership included an on-site resident and dedicated customer support, providing peace of mind and assuring stakeholders that critical health data is protected to the highest standards of security.
With Rubrik serving as the backbone of its data security strategy, ARIA established a robust security posture that aligns with NIST frameworks, allowing it to pass its audit with zero remediation. As the first Italian public administration to adopt such a comprehensive solution, ARIA set a powerful precedent for healthcare data security, ensuring the well-being of its 10 million citizens and the continuity of life-saving medical care
Additional Benefits
80% reduction in backup management
“With our previous solution, we were spending at least 10 hours per week managing our backups. With Rubrik, that time has gone down to 2 hours at most, giving back 52 days per year of productivity to our team.”
Seamless cloud archival and cost savings with Microsoft Azure
“Rubrik will be an integral part of our cloud roadmap over the next few years. Cloud integration was too complicated with our previous solution. Rubrik’s native integration with Azure ensures we’re able to maximize our storage efficiency as we scale our cloud footprint. This also allowed us to migrate off tape, eliminating unnecessary overhead and leading to immediate hard savings.”
Hyper-V integration
“We were early adopters of Hyper-V for its high performance and cost-effectiveness, so having a solution like Rubrik that can navigate our existing infrastructure with policy-driven intelligence was essential.”
World-class support
“With our legacy solution, our team would have to spend hours on the phone with support. I would also have to get on the phone in order to escalate and get the issue fixed. With Rubrik’s team, we’re always able to reach a skilled support engineer and our issues are often and solved within 15 minutes, including a detailed follow-up.”
Easy to use
“With Rubrik’s consumer-friendly interface, I always know where my data lives and exactly how to find it.”