In this scenario, you are the CISO for a publicly traded company. What protections would you implement to ensure availability of your systems (and why)?

Hailey Caram

As the CISO for a publicly traded company, there are various protections I believe must be implemented to ensure the availability of the company’s systems. The first measure I would take to ensure availability is instituting redundant systems to guarantee that operations would continue if the main systems were to go down. Redundancy also helps to minimize downtime in the event of a system failure; performance and continuity are crucial for the financial health of the company. Increased downtime can lead to a loss in revenue, but implementing redundant systems helps to avoid such losses. I would also create disaster recovery and business continuity plans. In the event of disruptions, outages, and disasters, having a plan already established would allow for operations to resume more smoothly. A quick and effective response to chaotic situations such as disasters, attacks, or outages is crucial for publicly traded companies. A disaster recovery and business continuity plan provides a structured approach and promises financial security and company continuity. Finally, I would be sure to implement load balancing to prevent the system from becoming overwhelmed. Load balancing optimizes network performance and availability across systems. By distributing traffic across the system’s network, it prevents a single server from becoming overloaded and failing. This could lead to loss of revenue or impact the end users’ experience. These are important considerations for a publicly traded company and directly impact the business’s revenue and shareholder value. As the CISO, instituting these protections ensures the availability of systems, which in turn allows for continued operations, business continuity, and the financial health of the company.