Okta launches enhanced data recovery for Australia

Okta has launched enhanced disaster recovery services in Australia, significantly strengthening data residency capabilities for local customers.

Speaking in Sydney during his visit to Australia, Jack Hirsch, Okta's Vice President of Product, said the company had completed a major infrastructure upgrade, moving its disaster recovery services from Singapore to Melbourne.

The change ensures that all customer data for Australian organisations now remains within the country.

"All customers in Australia will have their data resident only within continental Australia, including disaster recovery," Hirsch said.

Alongside this, Okta announced that Australian customers would become the first outside North America to access its new 'enhanced disaster recovery' offering, which guarantees a recovery time objective of five minutes or less - significantly faster than the standard one hour.

The initiative reflects Okta's commitment to the region, Hirsch said, describing the company as treating customer trust with "great reverence" - a phrase he repeated during the interview.

"We know identity is critical infrastructure. If identity is down, organisations are not selling, not transporting, not delivering healthcare. They grind to a halt," he said.

Hirsch explained that enhanced disaster recovery allows Okta to fail over a single tenant immediately, without impacting other customers.

This granular failover capability strengthens business continuity and mitigates downtime risks during major incidents.

He said the improvements were made possible following the recent completion of AWS's Melbourne region, allowing Okta to deploy full-service capabilities within Australia.

Okta's upgraded disaster recovery posture comes at a time of rising cybersecurity threats and growing complexity in identity management. Hirsch warned that businesses relying heavily on monolithic technology platforms may be exposing themselves to increased cyber risk.

"Consolidating your authentication and single sign-on with your productivity suite fundamentally is leaving the door open for threat actors," he said. "Identity security needs to span the entire tech ecosystem, not just one platform."

Hirsch outlined Okta's vision of an "identity security fabric" - a term he stressed repeatedly. This fabric is built from three pillars: secure identity products that protect users before, during and after authentication; orchestration across identity services; and deep integration with a diverse range of technologies.

"You can't get security right without getting identity right," Hirsch said. "Identity security needs to be comprehensive, frictionless, and it must integrate deeply with the diverse tech stack every organisation has."

During his meetings with Australian enterprise customers, Hirsch said demand was growing for solutions that secure both human and non-human identities, particularly as businesses deploy more AI agents.

"We are introducing waves of AI agents into the enterprise while static admin accounts sit unprotected," he said. "We need governance to make sure they have the least privilege necessary."

Okta's new offerings also focus on protecting these non-human identities, combining discovery, vaulting, rotation, and governance of credentials.

He said the company's approach differs from broader platform ecosystems by remaining neutral and committed to an open, partner-driven security ecosystem.

"We are the stewards of the open ecosystem," Hirsch said. "Identity security is an all-hands-on-deck challenge."

Reflecting on customer conversations, Hirsch said many were moving away from legacy Identity Governance and Administration (IGA) solutions.

"Over 50% of IGA deployments are in distress," he said, adding that customers want "faster, easier, more secure alternatives."

Okta's newer IGA product has already gained over 1,300 customers in just two and a half years, driven by what Hirsch described as a focus on ease of use, speed of deployment, and seamless integration.

"Security should be frictionless - it should fade into the background," he added.

Okta offers a free trial of its Okta Governance to show businesses the benefit of a unified identity platform, eliminating identity silos and streamlining. You can access the trial here.