Rubrik extends data protection to Apache Iceberg tables on AWS

Cloud data management and security company Rubrik Inc. unveiled Rubrik Apache Iceberg Protection, a new backup and recovery feature for Apache Iceberg tables on Amazon Web Services (AWS). The company sees a gap in native AWS tools. Iceberg snapshots are pointers to metadata, not actual copies, so when a table is deleted, encrypted, or overwritten, the snapshot history disappears too.

Restoring data files alone won't rebuild the table's catalog entry. Rubrik's solution copies that metadata, restoring the table and allowing immediate querying via Amazon Athena, Apache Spark, or Trino. Restoring files separately would require manual repair of Parquet files. Iceberg tables in AWS Glue Data Catalog and Amazon S3 are included.

Backups stay immutable in either AWS account or Rubrik's air-gapped Cloud Vault. Rubrik says this is the only Iceberg-aware protection with an in-account option after a full initial copy. The S3 storage class helps manage backup windows by keeping rarely accessed backup data in a lower-cost tier. Customers can take on-demand backups before risky operations like schema changes.

Restores can be placed on an isolated Iceberg branch, allowing teams to review data and schema before promoting the table back to production. Rubrik's Anneka Gupta highlighted that data lakes, including Apache Iceberg, are now essential for business operations, and the company has been extending its platform to cover these critical systems.

Apache Iceberg Protection will be available later this month. Rubrik has been adding cloud-native protection and governance features through the year, including cloud SQL protection and governance for Google Gemini agents and agent cloud support.